the emotional rollercoaster of organisational … abstract change is a potentially emotional event...
TRANSCRIPT
Copyright is owned by the Author of the thesis. Permission is given for a copy to be downloaded by an individual for the purpose of research and private study only. The thesis may not be reproduced elsewhere without the permission of the Author.
The Emotional Rollercoaster of Organisational Change:
Affective Responses to Organisational Change, their Cognitive Antecedents and
Behavioural Consequences
A thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Philosophy
in
Management
at Massey University, Auckland
New Zealand
Roy Kark Smollan
2009
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ABSTRACT
Change is a potentially emotional event as people anticipate or experience its outcomes
and processes. Managers and researchers often ignore the emotional aspects of
organisational change, yet it is precisely these aspects that can promote acceptance of
change or resistance to it.
The focus of the research is on the many factors that contribute to cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses to organisational change. A model of individual
responses evolved from the literature review and helped guide the research questions. It
indicates that responses to change depend on factors in four categories: those in the
change itself (outcomes, scale, temporal issues and justice); those in the employee (their
emotional intelligence, disposition, previous experience of change, and change and
stress outside the workplace); those in the employee’s perceptions of the
leaders/managers/agents (their leadership ability, emotional intelligence and
trustworthiness); and those in the employee’s perception of the organisation (its culture
and change context).
Two main research approaches underpinned the thesis. Firstly, cognitive
appraisal theory takes the position that emotion derives from cognition as people
contemplate the importance of events (such as organisational change) to their wellbeing
and consider how they will cope. Secondly, social constructionism was used as a
theoretical platform because it combines the individual experience of emotions during
change with the social forces that help shape them.
Twenty-four interviews were conducted in Auckland, New Zealand. The
participants were from a variety of industries, organisations, hierarchical levels, change
roles, functional departments and ethnic, gender and age groups. They reported on many
different types of change, small and large, with many focussing on some element of
organisational restructuring. The study showed that people played different roles in
change events - as leaders, managers, agents and recipients - and at times took on a
combination of these roles, which did not always depend on hierarchy. The roles they
played to some extent influenced their responses.
Findings show that all 13 factors in the model produced some responses, but not
in all participants. The most prevalent of these, and those that often provoke emotions
of the greatest intensity, were personal outcomes and the fairness of change. Two
additional factors surfaced, control over the change and support from colleagues and
people outside the organisation, and the model was revised to include them. The study
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confirmed that organisational change is indeed an emotional event, and that these
emotions arise from a host of factors that have individual, social and wider contextual
origins.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
To my family: Charlene, Gavin, Geoffrey, Anthony
Natalie, Neville, Hilary, Lesley, Dave, Adrian, Jonathan, Daniel
To my supervisors: Dr Jonathan Matheny, Dr Janet Sayers
To my managers: Professor Judith Pringle, Professor Kate Kearins, Barbara Myers
To my colleagues: Professor Ken Parry, Dr Ken Hyde, Dr Mark Le Fevre, Judy
Rowe and many others
To my consultants and colleagues (whose names must remain confidential) who
provided me with potential participants.
To my 24 interviewees (whose names must also remain confidential) who shared with
me their time, thoughts, emotions and actions, and without whom there would be no
thesis.
Thank you all for your guidance, support, encouragement and patience, as you and I
travelled on the emotional rollercoaster of organisational change.
Approval for the research has been obtained: MUAHEC 05/090.
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CONTENTS
ABSTRACT ....................................................................................................... ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................. iii
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES ................................................................. ix
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION ...................................................................... 1
1.1 Research Aims ...................................................................................... 1
1.2 The Emotional Rollercoaster of Organisational Change ...................... 2
1.3 Contributions to the Literature .............................................................. 3
1.4 Intended Audience ................................................................................ 5
1.5 Organisation of the Thesis .................................................................... 6
1.6 A Comment on Methodology ............................................................... 6
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................... 9
2.1 Introduction ........................................................................................... 9
2.2 Emotions ............................................................................................... 9
The Nature of Emotions ..................................................................... 9
Emotion and Other Affect Constructs ...................................... 10
Perspectives on Emotions ........................................................ 12
The evolutionary approach ................................................. 12
The physiological approach ............................................... 13
The cognitive approach ...................................................... 14
The psychodynamic approach ............................................ 16
The social constructionist approach ................................... 17
Overview of perspectives on emotions .............................. 18
Basic and Discrete Emotions ................................................... 19
Emotional Dimensions ............................................................. 22
Affect Measures ....................................................................... 25
Other Forms of Research into Emotion ................................... 28
Emotions and Change .............................................................. 28
Emotions in Organisations ............................................................... 29
The Role of Emotions in Organisational Life .......................... 29
Emotional Regulation............................................................... 33
Emotional Labour..................................................................... 34
Emotional Dissonance .............................................................. 38
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Emotional Contagion ............................................................... 39
Emotions and Organisational Change ...................................... 40
Emotional Intelligence (EI) ...................................................... 42
EI - Construct and Controversy ......................................... 42
Implications of EI for the workplace ................................ 47
EI and organisational change ............................................. 50
2.3 Organisational Change ........................................................................ 56
Typologies of Organisational Change .............................................. 56
Change Players ................................................................................. 62
Steps and Phases in the Process of Organisational Change ............. 66
2.4 Individual Responses to Change ......................................................... 68
2.5 Development of a new model of cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to organisational change ................................. 83
Introduction ...................................................................................... 83
Variables Mediating Cognitive Responses to Change ..................... 87
Perceived Favourability of Outcomes of Change .................... 87
Perceived Scale of the Change ................................................. 91
Perceived Frequency, Timing and Speed of the Change ......... 94
The frequency of the change .............................................. 95
The timing of the change.................................................... 96
The speed of the change ..................................................... 97
Perceived Justice of the Change ............................................... 99
Variables within the Employee’s Perception of Change Leaders,
Managers and Agents that Moderate Cognitive, Affective
and Behavioural Responses to Change .................................... 107
Emotional Intelligence (EI) .................................................... 107
Disposition ............................................................................. 109
Previous Experience of Change ............................................. 113
Change and Stress outside the Workplace ............................. 114
Variables within the Employee’s Perception of Change Leaders,
Managers and Agents that Moderate Cognitive, Affective and
Behavioural Responses to Change ........................................... 115
Perceived Leadership Ability of Change Leaders,
Managers and Agents ............................................................. 116
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Perceived Emotional Intelligence (EI) of Change Leaders,
Managers and Agents ............................................................. 119
Perceived Trustworthiness of Change Leaders, Managers
and Agents .............................................................................. 120
Variables within the Employee’s Perception of the Organisation
that Moderate Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural
Responses to Change ................................................................ 123
Perceived Organisational Culture .......................................... 123
Perceived Organisational Change Context............................. 130
2.6 Summary of Literature Review ......................................................... 132
CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY ................................................................. 135
3.1 Introduction ....................................................................................... 135
3.2 Choice of a Qualitative/Social Constructionist Approach ................ 135
The Goals of Qualitative Research ................................................ 135
Interpretivism, Constructivism and Social Constructionism ......... 138
Social Construction of Emotions, Change and Other Factors in
the Model.................................................................................. 141
3.3 Epistemological and Methodological Issues ..................................... 145
3.4 Method .............................................................................................. 148
The Participants .............................................................................. 148
The Interviews ................................................................................ 149
3.5 Ethical issues ..................................................................................... 154
3.6 Evaluating a Qualitative Study ......................................................... 156
CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS – THE DEDUCTIVE PHASE ........................... 160
4.1 Introduction ....................................................................................... 160
4.2 Method of Analysis ........................................................................... 160
4.3 Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to Organisational
Change ............................................................................................... 162
Variables Mediating Cognitive Responses to Change ................... 163
Perceived Favourability of Outcomes of Change .................. 163
Perceived Scale of the Change .............................................. 168
The Perceived Frequency, Timing and Speed of the
Change.................................................................................... 172
The frequency of the change ............................................ 172
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The timing of the change.................................................. 172
The speed of the change ................................................... 173
Perceived Justice of Change................................................... 177
Distributive justice ........................................................... 177
Procedural justice ............................................................. 178
Informational justice ........................................................ 179
Interpersonal justice ......................................................... 181
Variables within the employee moderating cognitive, affective
and behavioural responses to change ....................................... 185
Emotional Intelligence (EI) .................................................... 186
Disposition ............................................................................. 194
Previous Experience of Change ............................................. 202
Change and Stress outside the Workplace ............................. 206
Variables with in the Change Leaders/Managers Moderating
Employee’ Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses
to Change.................................................................................. 207
Perceived Leadership Abilities of Change Leaders and
Managers ................................................................................ 208
Perceived Emotional Intelligence (EI) of Change Leaders
and Managers ......................................................................... 213
Perceived Trustworthiness of the Change Leaders and
Managers ................................................................................ 216
Variables in the Organisation Moderating Cognitive, Affective
and Behavioural Responses to Change .................................... 221
Perceived Organisational Culture .......................................... 221
Perceived Change Context ..................................................... 227
4.4 Resistance to Change ........................................................................ 229
4.5 Summary of Deductive Phase and Key Themes ............................... 237
Personal Outcomes of Change ....................................................... 237
Justice of Change ........................................................................... 241
CHAPTER 5: FINDINGS – THE INDUCTIVE PHASE ............................. 245
5.1 Introduction ....................................................................................... 245
5.2 Control of Change ............................................................................. 245
5.3 Relationships with Colleagues, Family, Partners and Friends .......... 251
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Relationships with Colleagues ....................................................... 251
Relationships with Family, Partners and Friends ........................... 255
CHAPTER 6: REVIEW AND REVISION OF THE MODEL ..................... 257
CHAPTER 7: LIMITATIONS OF RESEARCH ........................................... 264
7.1 Depth, Breadth and Complexity of Change ...................................... 264
7.2 The Vagaries of Memory .................................................................. 265
7.3 Openness and Honesty ...................................................................... 266
7.4 Attribution Errors and Self-Serving Bias .......................................... 267
7.5 Inconsistency and Contradiction ....................................................... 268
7.6 Ability to Label and Articulate Emotions ......................................... 269
7.7 Qualitative Investigations of Emotional Intelligence (EI) and
Personality ......................................................................................... 270
7.8 Nature and Size of Interview Sample................................................ 274
CHAPTER 8: CONTRIBUTIONS, FURTHER RESEARCH
DIRECTIONS, PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS . 275
8.1 Overview of the Study ...................................................................... 275
8.2 Contributions to the Literature .......................................................... 276
8.3 Further Research Directions .............................................................. 277
8.4 Practical Implications ........................................................................ 279
8.5 Conclusions ....................................................................................... 281
CHAPTER 9: REFERENCES ....................................................................... 283
CHAPTER 10: APPENDICES ...................................................................... 341
Appendix 1: Participant Information ...................................................... 341
Appendix 2: Interview Questions ........................................................... 342
Appendix 3: Tables of data analysis ....................................................... 345
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LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES
Figure 1: Emotion Circumplexes .................................................................................... 24
Figure 2: Mayer and Salovey, 1997: The Four Branches of Emotional Intelligence ..... 44
Figure 3: Models of Support for and Resistance to Change ........................................... 74
Figure 4: Model of Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to
Organisational Change ............................................................................................ 84
Figure 5: Revised Model of Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to
Organisational Change ....................................................................................... 263
Table 1: Basic Emotions ................................................................................................. 21
Table 2: Mood and Emotion Scales ................................................................................ 26
Table 3: Typologies of Change ....................................................................................... 58
Table 4: Targets of Change ............................................................................................. 61
Tables of data analysis………………………………………………………………...345
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CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1 Research Aims
According to Cameron (2006, p. 317), “not only is change ubiquitous and
unpredictable, but almost everyone also assumes that its velocity will increase
exponentially.” From a managerial perspective it is necessary for organisations to adapt
to changes in their external and internal environments, and thereby take advantage of
opportunities, ward off threats and improve performance. For change to be successful it
needs to be the right type of change, implemented at the right time and in the right way.
What is considered ‘right’ needs to take account of the human element and ‘right’ is a
concept that is both subjective and objective. Moreover, change leaders, managers and
agents often mistakenly assume that their conceptions of the purposes and processes of
change are shared by others at all levels. Similarly, they often do not understand how
each person involved in change responds on an individual level.
Those involved in change likewise tend to assume that the way people react on a
cognitive basis is, or should be, rational, and that emotional responses are not rational
(Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996). Those who plan and implement change may not foresee
emotional responses to organisational change - and to most aspects of organisational life
- and even if they do, may ignore them. However, as this thesis will seek to
demonstrate, affective responses to change can play a crucial role in the success or
failure of change initiatives, as they do in other areas of employee and organisational
performance. Emotions are generally rational and have cognitive antecedents. The
cognitive and affective responses tend to operate together to influence, but not
necessarily determine, behaviour. People who have high levels of emotional intelligence
(Mayer & Salovey, 1997), the ability to understand and manage their own and others’
emotions, should be able to play a constructive role in managing and experiencing
organisational change.
The aims of this research study are to investigate the impact of emotion on the
experience of change at the individual level, to examine these experiences from the
perspectives of people who play different change-related roles, to identify the causes
and consequences of emotional responses, and to explore the strategies individuals use
to cope with the change events and the ensuing emotions.
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1.2 The Emotional Rollercoaster of Organisational Change
Emotions are phenomena that are experienced in many areas of human existence, and a
change in these spheres is frequently emotional, sometimes intensely so. Life changes,
such as births, marriages and deaths, as well as political, economic, social, technological
and ecological changes, can create favourable and/or unfavourable conditions.
Happiness, pride, sadness, anger and fear are universal responses to environmental
conditions and inter-personal relations and changes to them. As much as managers (and
some scholars) would wish to exclude emotions from the organisational sphere, they are
naturally present there too, particularly during times of change.
Change can be an emotional rollercoaster. It has different phases and surprising
twists and bends. It varies between slower and faster paces. It moves at different
trajectories, upwards to dizzying heights and downwards to what Elrod and Tippett
(2002) call the ‘death valley’ where negative emotions and poor performance occur. It
can be exciting and scary and leave one buzzing or drained. The rollercoaster concept
has been used in practitioner publications (e.g. Goss, Pascale & Athos, 1993; Schneider
& Goldwasser, 1998) and is widely referred to by organisational change consultants, as
web searches indicate. It has also entered the academic literature. Kochan (1999, p.
320), for example, describes change as “like riding a rollercoaster, with many up and
down periods and thrilling moments punctuated with stress.” She writes eloquently of
the range of positive and negative emotions that occur during change and how
participants can experience self-doubt: When these moods come upon me, it is as if the rainclouds are hovering overhead,
threatening to burst and pound on me as I swirl around in the rollercoaster seat, wondering
what kind of condition I will be in when the ride is ended and I can debark. However, it
seems that whenever the clouds are their darkest and I am weary of the thrill, the sun comes
up and the cars begin their exhilarating ascent.
However, the rollercoaster metaphor has several limitations. Firstly, a
rollercoaster ride has a distinct beginning and end while many types of organisational
change do not. Secondly, in a metaphorical sense the upward phases are representative
of positive emotions (as the various models in Elrod and Tippett’s (2000) article depict)
whereas on a funfair ride they are less thrilling than the downward phases, which in
terms of the metaphor indicate negative emotions. Thirdly, the funfair ride is aimed at
entertainment whereas organisational change is certainly not. However, what the two
have in common is that there are definite ups and downs over time even though the ride
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does not necessarily create positive emotions on the upward phases and negative
emotions on the downward phases. A telling point is that four of the participants in my
research study directly referred to the rollercoaster of change that they or others had
experienced, and other participants used terms, such as ‘grief cycle’, that are evocative
of oscillations between the positive and negative emotions of change. The responses of
others bore testimony to the emotional ride that organisational change had delivered.
With this evidence and the literature cites in mind, I amended the earlier working title of
this thesis to read as: The Emotional Rollercoaster of Organisational Change: Affective
Responses to Organisational Change, their Cognitive Antecedents and Behavioural
Consequences.
1.3 Contributions to the Literature
Having researched empirical studies into emotions in organisational life fairly recently,
Briner and Kiefer (2005) found the surprisingly small number of 32 articles or book
chapters. Therefore this thesis will add to the empirical literature on the experience of
emotion in work-related settings and the even smaller body of research into the
emotional aspects of organisational change. In certain parts of the literature, for
example, on emotional intelligence and personality, qualitative research is exceptionally
rare, let alone in the context of organisational change. This thesis seeks to break new
ground in presenting the participants’ views on how these factors influenced their
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change.
The second contribution to the literature lies in the analysis of the experience of
change from the perspective of a variety of individual stakeholders who are involved in
an organisational change. While previous studies have usually focused on leaders and
managers of change (e.g. Caldwell, 2003), consultants in change (e.g. Furnham, 2001),
or recipients of change (e.g. Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006), this study will examine the
experience of people in all of these categories, and reveal how an individual may play
any one of these roles, or a combination of them, in a change initiative. It will also show
how at times the role they played contributed to their responses.
A third contribution lies in the presentation of a model of cognitive, affective
and behavioural responses to organisational change that seeks to include a wide-ranging
set of factors that impact on how people perceive the outcomes of change, and the
processes that design and deliver them (see Figure 4). An earlier version of the model
was published in the Journal of Change Management (Smollan, 2006b). It is informed
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by models of emotional reactions to change presented by Gibson (1995), Paterson and
Härtel (2002), Paterson and Cary (2002), Brotheridge (2003), Kiefer (2005), Piderit
(1999), Szabla (2007) and others, some of which have been influenced by the Affective
Events Theory of Weiss and Cropanzano (1996). This last theory posits that events at
work are proximal causes of emotional reactions which in turn lead to affect- and
judgement-driven behaviours. Change is potentially an affective event and therefore this
model, and the other ‘emotions-of-change’ models, will be analysed in more depth in
the literature review.
My model will seek to show a larger number of factors that could impact on the
affective reactions to change, and in a wider range of contexts, than those presented by
the authors cited above. For example, Paterson and Härtel (2002) and Paterson and Cary
(2002) focus on downsizing and Kiefer’s (2005) investigates only negative emotions.
Holt, Armenakis, Feild and Harris (2007) have developed a useful framework of
readiness for change that incorporates four elements - context, content, process and
individual attributes - all of which are present in aspects of my model. However, they
are curiously silent on affective responses. The new model will also make a contribution
to understanding how various affect constructs, such as emotional intelligence and
emotional labour, relate to the experience of organisational change at the individual
level. The literature in these areas is minimal but beginning to blossom.
My model indicates that a change event (or set of events) triggers cognitive
reactions. Following Lazarus’ (1991, 1993, 1999) cognitive appraisal theory, cognitive
responses unleash emotional reactions as people contemplate the significance of the
change for themselves and consider a variety of coping mechanisms (Latack, 1986;
Fugate, Kinicki & Prussia, 2008). Together the cognitive and affective responses tend to
produce congruent behavioural responses. However, as the literature review and model
will show, people often consider the ramifications of their actions and, despite their
desire to act in certain ways, may modify their preferred behaviour. On the other hand,
some people are unable to control their affective impulses and act rashly and
irrationally.
A number of variables that potentially moderate cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to change are presented in the model. They are grouped into four
sets of factors. The first relates to the nature of the change, the second to individual
attributes of the employees, the third to employee perceptions of aspects of their leaders
and the fourth to employee perceptions of aspects of the organisations in which they
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work. Employee reactions may result in the demise of, or modifications to, the original
change plan, demonstrating the potentially circular nature of the model. Each of these
variables provides the foundation for the research questions that are presented, and
which the empirical work will seek to answer.
While the nature of the change context will be discussed in more detail in the
literature review, it should be noted here that models attempt to simplify what is often a
complex set of interacting relationships. Given that people may respond differently to a
single change, the nature of the change itself can produce vastly differing dynamics.
Some changes will have primarily negative outcomes, such as in downsizing, while
others might be predominantly positive, such as a more lucrative remuneration system.
Implementing the former will clearly present more difficult challenges for most of the
people concerned. ‘Selling the vision’ of a major international expansion or the
development of a new product line has different connotations for leadership than a
major redundancy exercise would. The concept of vision is also difficult to apply to
some changes, such as the introduction of a new form of invoice or the cancellation of
the office plant maintenance service. However, it should be emphasised that even small
changes may elicit emotional reactions and these can impact on the success of the
change - and the job satisfaction and performance of individuals in other areas of their
jobs.
1.4 Intended Audience
The research is ultimately aimed at several types of readers. Firstly, it should help
scholars to understand not only what emotions were experienced by the respondents, but
also why they experienced them, what actions they took, and why they took them. In
doing so, scholars will get a deeper understanding of the psychological processes that
are reported with regard to change events, and in particular the affective responses.
Secondly, people in employment could be stimulated into thinking of the
dynamics that occurred when they, and others at work, experienced organisational
change, specifically what they thought, what they felt and what they did. This could be
used to help them understand the range of reactions they could experience during a
current or future change event, and more specifically how they could deal with the
emotional aspects. It should also produce greater insight into the emotional responses of
others inside and outside the organisation.
Thirdly, leaders, managers and other facilitators of change will be better able to
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identify the emotional components of change processes and how they are related to
cognitive and behavioural factors. This should help them to predict employee reactions
to change (and their own) and to respond appropriately, for the benefit of both the
organisation and its employees.
1.5 Organisation of the Thesis
This thesis is organised as follows. Chapter 2 is the literature review which begins with
an analysis of emotions and their influence in organisational life. The study of emotions
lies primarily in the field of psychology - clinical, social, educational, counselling and
organisational - but also draws on publications in the fields of philosophy, sociology,
religious studies, management and organisational behaviour. The nature of
organisational change is then introduced. Following this, emotions and organisational
change are integrated in a model of individual cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses to change. Chapter 3 is about the methodology used for this study, and
introduces the participants. In Chapter 4 I present and analyse the findings from the
deductive phase of the empirical work, the responses to the 13 research questions
embedded in the model. Chapter 5 is a discussion of the factors that emerged in the
inductive phases of data analysis and in Chapter 6 I present a revised model to integrate
the deductive and inductive aspects of the study. Chapter 7 identifies the limitations of
the study while Chapter 8 contains a discussion of the contributions of the study,
suggestions for further research, implications for practice and conclusions.
1.6 A Comment on Methodology
This research study employs idiographic and social constructionist approaches, which
lie within the interpretive school of thought, since they allow for an in-depth exploration
of the ways in which individuals make sense of life events and of the social forces that
mould their responses. Social constructionist approaches have been used in the study of
emotions and change, as well as in a number of the factors that appear in the model.
Semi-structured interviews sought to uncover how various people reacted to
organisational change events and why. Given that the use of models in qualitative
studies is not common I here outline why and how I developed a model and used it.
A model has the purpose of presenting an array of relationships that seek to
establish the causes and consequences of constructs such as cognition, emotion and
behaviour. Veal (2005) suggests that a theoretical framework might be termed a model
7
particularly when quantitative techniques are being used. In this light Thomas (2006, p.
57) directly focuses on the statistical features in model building, which conventionally
“involves specifying variables and their relations and formulating mathematical
equations that will depict the various states of the system under varying conditions.”
Silverman (2001, p. 3) uses the word model as the equivalent of an idiom or paradigm,
in that “Models provide an overall framework for how we look at reality.” According to
Frankfort-Nachmias and Nachmias (2000, p. 41): A model…is a representation of reality: It outlines those aspects of the real world the
scientist considers to be relevant to the problem investigated, it makes explicit the
significant relationships among those aspects, and it enables the researcher to formulate
empirically testable propositions regarding the nature of these relationships…Models are
also used for gaining insights into phenomena that the scientist cannot readily observe
directly.
The definitions above identify a model as a representation of ‘reality’. These
definitions allow researchers to investigate phenomena, or relationships between them,
with qualitative methodologies, even though quantitative testing of models is more
common. Miles and Huberman (1994, p. 153), in their sourcebook on analysing
qualitative data, use the term causal network, which is a “display of the most important
independent and dependent variables in a field study (shown in boxes) and of the
relationships among them (shown by arrows).” The authors provide a very detailed
explanation of how causal networks, which look identical in shape and form to
quantitatively testable models, can be used to qualitatively depict the multifarious facets
of the phenomena under study. Causal networks can be constructed in inductive or
deductive ways, which they maintain are “dialectical, rather than mutually exclusive
research procedures” (p. 155). Furthermore, and again using language that is typical of
quantitative research, they argue that causal networks can be used to make - and test -
predictions of cause and effect. Given the complex nature of the relationships between
the variables being studied, qualitative approaches seek to explain how individuals
respond to events and issues, and what underlies both their similarities and differences
(Patton, 2002; Hyde, 2000).
In the elucidation of the model I have used the terms moderators and mediators,
which are the conventional terminology of a quantitative paradigm. However, Zerbe and
Härtel (2000, p. 157) point out that “Although borrowed from quantitative approaches
to organizational studies, the relationships they [i.e. moderators and mediators] denote
apply just as well to the result of qualitative studies.” Therefore, they suggest,
8
qualitative researchers are justified in exploring factors that mediate and moderate
relationships at work, not in an attempt to “squeeze our understanding of emotions into
the straightjacket of quantitative methodology” (p. 157) but rather to facilitate
understanding of the role of emotion in these relationships. For example, if perceptions
of fairness are considered to mediate evaluations of the positive or negative nature of an
organisational change, an in-depth interview could reveal which aspects of fairness were
the most salient, and which emotions were evoked in the individual. The interview
questions for the current study were formulated to examine the relevance of the factors
embedded in the model.
The data analysis went through two phases of development - deductive and
inductive. According to Hyde (2000), a deductive approach seeks to test theory and is
traditionally believed to be the province of quantitative research, while an inductive
approach aims to develop theory, and is generally considered a qualitative approach.
Hyde, however, argues that deductive and inductive methodologies approaches can be
profitably used in both types of research, and that, in fact, researchers frequently
oscillate between the two. Similarly, Patton (2002, p. 55) feels that “Qualitative enquiry
is particularly oriented toward exploration, discovery and inductive logic”, but also
argues that deductive reasoning helps to determine the nature of some of the research
questions. The findings and discussion from the deductive stage revolve around the
factors built into the model. I anticipated an inductive phase from the beginning. While
the aim of the model was to include all relevant factors influencing emotional responses
to change I was keen to find out whether other factors may have played a part. Further
analysis of the interview transcripts did reveal additional issues. An integration of both
phases of the findings led to a review and revision of the model.
9
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1 Introduction
This study focuses on the emotions triggered by organisational change. Emotions arise
from both the actual and anticipated consequences of the change and the various
processes through which the changes are introduced and implemented. The aim of this
study is to gain a deeper understanding of the emotions that occur as a result of change
outcomes and processes, of their antecedents and consequences, and of how employees
at various levels and in various change roles experience and manage these emotions.
In one sense the antecedents of affective reactions are the various incidents,
issues and relationships that are present in organisational life, and in this specific
context, organisational change. In another sense the antecedents of affective reactions
are the cognitive responses to change initiatives. The cognitive and affective elements
combine in some form to produce or constrain behavioural reactions.
This chapter consists of three main parts. The first is a review of the literature on
emotions, including the key concepts of emotional intelligence and emotional labour.
The second is a review of the literature on organisational change, with an emphasis on
responses at the individual level. The third part integrates the first two with the
development of a model of individual cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to
organisational change. Emerging from the literature review and the model are the
research questions which in turn drive the empirical work.
2.2 Emotions
In this section of the literature review I start with a broad understanding of the nature of
emotions, move on to the role of emotion in organisational life and finally explore the
nature of emotional intelligence. In various parts of these sections I refer to the
emotional aspects of change and provide a fuller review at the end of each section.
The Nature of Emotions
To lay the foundation for an understanding of how emotions arise during change, I will
distinguish between emotion and other affect constructs, examine definitions of
emotions from various perspectives, explore the debate about the nature and number of
basic or discrete emotions, investigate the arguments for and against various emotion
dimensions and measures, and identify the links between emotion and cognition.
10
Finally, I analyse the emotional aspects of change.
Emotion and Other Affect Constructs
Watson and Clark (1994, p. 89) define emotion as “an organized and highly structured
reaction to an event that is relevant to the needs, goals or survival of an organism.”
Emotions are immediate responses to environmental stimuli and tend to be short in
duration (Frijda, 1988; Gray & Watson, 2001). They are also considered to be shaped
by culture and are “instrumental in defining relations of deference, position, status and
authority” (Antonacopoulou & Gabriel, 2001, p. 437). The term emotion is often
equated with that of feeling (Frijda, 2000; Feldman Barrett, 2004), yet Solomon (2003),
in an article originally written in 1976, indicates that feelings tend to have a
physiological component and are less sophisticated than emotions, which have a
stronger cognitive basis. Parrott (2002, p. 342) likewise considers emotions to embrace
a wider range of psychological mechanisms, including “appraisal, readiness to think and
act in certain ways, physiological changes, and social signals and dispositions, as well
as feelings.”
Moods are more diffuse in nature, not always specifically linked to events or
objects, lower in intensity and longer lasting (Frijda, 1993; Gray & Watson, 2001;
Weiss, 2002). Moods influence what people think and how they think (Forgas &
Vargas, 2000). They tend to have multiple inputs and shape the way in which people
encounter their environments (Gray & Watson, 2001). Moods can be state (a temporary
condition) or trait (a dispositional inclination to respond in certain ways) (Meyer &
Shack, 1989). The latter can influence the former in that a predisposition to negative
affectivity (Watson & Tellegen, 1985), for example, would likely result in more
negative state moods than those with positive affectivity. Positive Affect (PA)
“represents the extent to which a person avows a zest for life” while Negative Affect
(NA) is the “extent to which a person reports feeling upset or unpleasantly aroused”
(Watson & Tellegen, 1985, p. 221). A later article (Watson, Clark & Tellegen, 1988, p.
1063) provides a more elaborate definition in which high PA is “the extent to which a
person feels enthusiastic, active and alert,” with low PA referring to emotions such as
sadness and lethargy. In contrast, NA is a “general dimension of subjective distress and
unpleasurable engagement that subsumes a variety of aversive mood states, including
anger, contempt, disgust, guilt, fear and nervousness, with low NA being a state of
calmness and serenity.”
11
Temperament is a facet of personality that predisposes a person to act in a
certain way and is a relatively stable and largely biologically-rooted pattern of
individual differences (Bates, 2000). According to Allport (1937, p. 54): Temperament refers to the characteristic phenomena of an individual’s emotional nature,
including his susceptibility to emotional stimulation, his customary strength and speed of
response, the quality of his prevailing mood, and all peculiarities of fluctuation and
intensity of mood; these phenomena being regarded as dependent on constitutional makeup
and therefore largely hereditary in origin.
Eliasz (1990) queries the generally-accepted notion that temperament is stable
across time and situations by suggesting that while the former is true, people may act
differently in different situations. Bates (2000) believes that the emotional components
of temperament can be modified by social interaction. For example, tendencies towards
anger and aggression may be regulated by the individual when rewards and punishment
for certain types of behaviour are considered.
Disposition is a term used in personality research to denote a tendency (through
heredity or environmental influence) to think, feel and act in patterned ways. House,
Shane and Herold (1996, p. 205) describe dispositions “as psychological, as opposed to
physical or other objectively assessed characteristics of individuals - personality
characteristics, need states, attitudes, preferences and motives.” The constructs of mood
and disposition intersect when trait mood is dependent on tendencies towards, for
example, positive and negative affect (Watson & Tellegen, 1985).
Affect is an overarching construct that encompasses emotions, feelings, moods
and temperament (Weiss, 2002; Barsade & Gibson, 2007). Isen (2000) uses the term as
a broad concept of emotional well-being and has linked positive affect to creativity,
problem solving and negotiation.
The constructs of emotion, feeling, temperament and mood, while conceptually
different, can impact on each other. For example, intense anger or fear evoked by an
incident can evolve into a general mood of irritability or anxiety. Disposition, such as
trait negativity or anxiety, can result in emotions being readily felt and contribute to
nervous or irritable moods (Fisher, 1997; Gray & Watson, 2001). Briner and Kiefer
(2005) warn that confusing emotion and mood obscures the true nature of emotional
experience. In recalling the affective components of a change, a person cannot always
distinguish between the sudden onset of feeling that is characteristic of an emotion from
the more diffuse nature of mood that follows. For example, a mood of anxiety may have
other causes apart from, say, the announcement of a change at work. Moods may derive
12
from events and issues outside of the workplace, and even within the workplace may
relate to issues unrelated to a change. Given that change takes place over time, moods
and emotions themselves change and research subjects, and the researchers themselves,
may find it difficult to ascertain whether a response derives from emotion or mood, or
both.
Perspectives on Emotions
The study of emotions has been characterised by Weiss (2002) to comprise three main
traditions: evolutionary, cognitive and physiological. Other authors (e.g. Fineman,
1993b; 2000b; Ashforth & Humphrey, 1995) have taken a social constructionist
approach which they say has superseded the psychodynamic approach of Freud and
others. There are considerable overlaps in the varying perspectives with a general
agreement that emotion is fundamentally concerned with the ways in which people react
to their environments. Given that the model of responses to changes presented in Figure
4 has a strong cognitive focus with an equally strong orientation towards social
influences, these two perspectives will be accorded a deeper treatment in various parts
of this study.
The evolutionary approach
The evolutionary approach draws on the work of Darwin (1872, cited in Weiss, 2002),
who took the position that emotions are adaptive functions in humans that help them
react to a wide range of stimuli. Izard (1992, p. 35) indicates that this school of thought
assumes emotions to be “specific neuropsychological phenomena, shaped by natural
selection, that organize and motivate physiological, cognitive and action patterns that
facilitate adaptive responses to the vast array of demands and opportunities in the
environment.” Emotions play a role in the functioning of consciousness, facilitate social
behaviour and interaction, contribute towards the ability to solve problems and enhance
memory (Izard, 2002). Emotions communicate information from one person to another,
regulate individual reactions and contribute towards survival (Plutchik, 1994). Frijda
(2000) speculates that the evolutionary approach to emotion may now have run its
course and that the physical and social environments of the modern age (at least for
most people) do not require the same adaptive strategies.
Cosmides and Tooby (2000, p. 93) outline a range of processes that occur in the
experience of an emotion and the wide range of “mental programs” that accompany it,
13
such as shifts in perception, goal evaluation and motivation, information gathering,
conceptual frame shifts, memory, communication, inference activation, learning,
physiology changes and behaviour. The process of evolution has provided people with
“superordinate programs - the emotions” that direct their responses to environmental
stimuli (p. 94).
The role of facial expression in the study of emotions has been an important area
of research but the universality of emotional expression across cultures has been the
subject of some controversy (Ekman, 1994a). Evolutionary theories on emotion posit
that facial expressions are biological responses to stimuli that, inter alia, communicate
important information to others (Turner & Ortony, 1992; Izard, 1992). Given that the
evolution of the human species is to large extent a physiological process, a school of
research has focused on how emotions arise from bodily sensations (such as pain or
pleasure) and move along neural and chemical pathways. This is discussed in the next
section.
The physiological approach
Theorists of the physiological bases of emotions have focused on the location of
emotion in the brain and central nervous system and on the chemical relationship
between perceptions of events and biological responses (Ledoux, 1994; Panksepp,
1994b). Levenson (1994) differs from some of the other researchers in claiming that
specific emotions are accompanied by different physiological patterns. For example,
disgust produces a lower heart rate than fear, sadness or anger, but anger has a greater
affect on skin temperature than fear. One promising line of research was highlighted in
a special edition on the brain in Time magazine (Lemonick, 2007, p. 80), in which
McGaugh, an academic neurobiologist, states, “Any kind of emotional experience will
create stronger memory than would otherwise be created.” If emotions enhance
memory, there is a direct connection to the evolutionary approach that emotions
strengthen the ability to survive difficult experiences or repeat pleasurable experiences,
and to the cognitive tradition that relates cognition to emotion. Research by Talarico,
Labar and Rubin (2004) showed clearly that the intensity of an emotion plays a far
stronger role in recall than valence or age of memory.
While research into the evolutionary and physiological aspects of emotion is
broadening understanding of the nature of emotion, the relevance of this line of
investigation is peripheral to this thesis. A wide range of perspectives on the physiology
14
of emotion is found in Ekman and Davidson (1994), Harré and Parrott (1996) and Lewis
and Havilland-Jones (2000) and a recent overview of developments is provided by
Feldman Barrett, Mequita, Oschner and Gross (2007). Organisational psychologists
(e.g. Weiss, 2002; King, 2001) note that research into physiology paints a wider picture
of the nature of emotions but naturally these scholars have been more concerned with
the way in which emotions occur in organisational settings and how people make sense
of emotional experience.
The cognitive approach
Cognitive approaches to the study of emotion focus on the interpretive processes people
engage in when faced with certain stimuli. Ortony, Clore and Collins (1988, p. 13)
define emotions as “valenced reactions to events, agents or objects, with their particular
nature being determined by the way in which the eliciting event is construed.” They
propose a general theory of the cognitive antecedents of emotions and delineate the
cognitive processes that generate discrete emotions and their effects. Theorists such as
Scherer (1999) and Smith and Kirby (2001) have also focused on the processes used in
determining meaning from emotion-eliciting events. The study of emotions from the
standpoint of some philosophers also identifies the central role of cognition in emotion
(e.g. Solomon, 2003).
Cognition usually precedes emotion and Frijda (1988) has developed what he
terms a ‘law of situational meaning’ in which an emotion is a likely outcome of a chain
of thought that assigns meaning to events. Lazarus (1991, p. 353) is blunt in his
assertion that “emotions cannot occur without some kind of thought” and that the
process may be bi-directional, a view supported by Craib (1995). Cognitive processes
may be quick and semi-automatic or more considered (Elfenbein, 2007; Leventhal &
Scherer, 1987; Lazarus, 1991; Zajonc, 1998; Bargh & Chartrand, 1999). Parrott (2002,
p. 342) considers appraisal to be “cognitive in a way that is more like perception than
like reasoning or knowledge”, and focuses on the potential wellbeing of the individual.
He further points out, “From this perspective positive and negative emotions are not so
much pleasant and unpleasant hedonic states as they are favorable and unfavorable
assessments of one’s personal circumstances” (p. 343).
Emotion alerts the individual to factors in the environment which are potentially
significant. For example, a feeling of anxiety heightens awareness of the need to take
action; guilt and anger produce thoughts that may lead to redress of injustice. Weick
15
(1995, p. 45) suggests that an interruption to work flow “induces an emotional response,
which then paves the way for emotion to influence sense-making.” However, critics of a
narrow cognitive approach (Izard, 1992; Zajonc, 1980) assert that emotion can occur
without cognition, such as the anxiety and surprise that occur from a sudden experience
of pain, and that people can experience an emotion without knowing why (Craib, 1995).
The literature on mood is more tolerant of the view that affect can occur without the
individual always being aware of the cause (Barsade & Gibson, 2007; Weiss, 2002).
Lazarus and colleagues (Lazarus, 1991; Folkman & Lazarus, 1985; Folkman,
Lazarus, Gruen & DeLongis, 1986) describe the relationship between cognition and
emotion as occurring in two stages. Primary appraisal refers to a perception of a
potentially emotion-inducing event and focuses on the relevance of the issue to the
individual. Secondary appraisal is a process of considering how the person might cope.
Support for this approach has been given by Elfenbein (2007, p. 323), who states that
cognitive appraisal theory is “underappreciated for its power to shed light on
phenomena central to organizations.”
Folkman and Lazarus (1985, 1988) identified two forms of coping with stressful
encounters. Problem-focused coping is an action-oriented response whereby a person
seeks to address the issues causing the emotion, for example by using ‘confrontive
coping’ and ‘planful problem-solving’. While their study was not done in an
organisational change context, Folkman and Lazarus (1988, p. 473) speculate that
people “who experience distress when receiving notification of imminent layoffs are
likely to feel better when they begin to make plans for finding new work”, a view
corroborated by Paterson and Härtel (2002) in their model on downsizing. Emotion-
focused coping is a mechanism that is used to manage the emotional effects of the
event, such as distancing, self-control and positive reappraisal, the last being a
perception that the person has grown through the experience.
Folkman and Lazarus (1988) point out that one cannot always designate an
action as only problem-focused or emotion-focused. Steps taken to solve the problem
(for example, by talking to the person responsible for causing it) can also have the effect
of reducing the negative emotion associated with it. Some approaches are considered
adaptive, others maladaptive, but as the authors point out, it depends on the context. For
example, while ‘planful problem-solving’ is generally adaptive it will become
maladaptive if the person stubbornly persists with an ineffective strategy. Conversely,
‘confrontive coping’, which they see as essentially maladaptive, might on occasion
16
produce a beneficial outcome and reduce a negative emotion. Folkman and Moskowitz
(2000) note that the coping literature has focused mainly on negative emotions, and
comment on how the use of positive emotions helps to mitigate the negative emotions
caused by stressful events. Coping through positive reappraisal - or looking on the
bright side - is a reframing of a situation that allows for more productive action and a
reduction in negative emotions such as anxiety and helplessness.
Latack (1986) divides coping with stress into three main strategies: avoidance
(absenteeism, sick leave, turnover), control (taking charge, working harder and longer,
asking for help) and managing the symptoms (getting more sleep, exercising). She
found that people who adopted control strategies coped best but acknowledged that the
nature of the situation has to be taken into account. If people cannot control an issue or
event they resort to the other two strategies. According to Smith and Ellsworth (1985),
control over a situation helps a person deal with the emotions that arise. Negative
emotions eventuate when events are controlled by others or lie beyond anyone’s control
(such as in natural disasters or economic crises). Emotions such as guilt or
embarrassment occur when a person has control over events but takes no action or the
wrong action.
Not only has emotion been viewed as “an underprivileged area in psychology”
(Frijda, 1988, p. 349), it has also been seen as the opposite of reason, with researchers
reporting that emotion has been considered irrelevant, counter-productive and
dysfunctional (Domagalski, 1999). The philosopher Solomon (2003, p. 3), sought to
counter this view by firmly stating that “emotions are rational and purposive rather than
irrational and disruptive.” He pours scorn on the notion that emotions are irrational: The emotions are said to be stupid, unsophisticated, childish, if not utterly infantile,
primitive or animalistic - relics from our primal past and perverse and barbaric origins. The
emotions are said to be disruptions, interfering with our purposes in life, embarrassing us
and making fools of us, destroying careers and marriages, and ruining our relationships
with other people (p. 34).
The debate has penetrated the study of the role of emotion in organisational life,
which will be dealt with later in the literature review, as will the nature of emotional
intelligence, which has been considered as the ability to reason with and about emotion
(Salovey & Mayer, 1990).
The psychodynamic approach
Psychoanalytical and psychodynamic theories of emotion, according to Fineman
17
(1993b, p. 3), are based on Freudian approaches to the interpretation of emotion as
emerging from the unconscious “and invisible world of personal anxieties, fears and
yearnings.” Here “we are unaware of some of our most basic motivations and feelings;
they are repressed, pushed from consciousness, because of the anxiety, guilt or shame
arising from the events with which they are associated” (Fineman, 1993c, p. 24).
Psychodynamic treatments of organisational life have pointed to the range of
emotions that emerge as people come to grips with concepts of identity, power and,
notably for this thesis, change (Carr, 1999, 2001). According to Carr (2001, p. 429),
“the processes involved in the relationship between employee and organization are
deep-seated, largely unconscious, intimately connected to the development of identity;
and have emotional content.” He suggests that change ‘dislodges’ identity and leads to
anxiety and grieving. French (2001, p. 485) also believes that a psychoanalytical
perspective on organisational change produces useful insight into people’s emotional
responses as they manifest themselves in patterns of “denial, avoidance and resistance”.
Antonacopoulou and Gabriel (2001) indicate that psychoanalytical studies of emotions
have focused on irrationality and ambivalence, as people try to reconcile conflicting
thoughts and feelings, which the authors suggest is typically done during organisational
change.
A number of authors have related psychodynamic approaches to emotions,
including those arising from change, to social constructionist approaches. As Vince
(2006, p. 346) puts it, “Psychodynamic theory offers the insight that feelings are not
only private experiences, but are shaped by, and linked to, the internalization or denial,
of self-other relations.” He also notes that meanings and feelings emerge during change
events and are influenced by political, social and cultural forces within organisational
contexts. Gabriel (1998) has also sought a ‘rapprochement’ between psychodynamic
and constructionist views, claiming that inner emotional experiences are moulded by
social forces. The social constructionist approach is therefore the last main perspective
engaged here.
The social constructionist approach
Kemper (2000) suggests that emotions, as socially constructed phenomena, are derived
from evolutionary and cognitive forces. Issues of power, authority and status condition
people to display or hide emotions in ‘appropriate’ ways. According to Fineman
(2000b), emotions are responses by individuals to the social rules, implicit and explicit,
18
that are part of the wider culture in which they live. Social mores and norms drive much
of the experience, expression and suppression of emotions (Antonacopoulou & Gabriel,
2001). Hochschild (1983) takes a sociological perspective on emotions as expected
behaviour, and as taught responses to events and relationships. Social constructionists
(e.g. Harré, 1986; Burkitt, 1997; Clarke, 2003) take account of the biological facets of
emotions, such as heartbeat and perspiration, but argue that individuals experience and
understand emotion through the media of social relationships and language. However,
even within this tradition, there are differences in opinion as to whether emotions are
totally or partly socially constructed (Schwandt, 2003).
Taking an organisational perspective, Ashforth and Humphrey (1995, p. 100)
reflect that “Cultures - whether societal, organizational, occupational, departmental, etc.
- provide beliefs about emotional states, a vocabulary for discussing them and a set of
socially-acceptable attributions for the states.” The literature on emotional labour (e.g.
Mann, 1999b; Bolton, 2005; Smollan, 2006c), emphasises the cultural expectations
(from multiple sources) that people will express or suppress emotions at work. There is
also a strong line of thinking that emotions at work have been ‘captured’, ‘harnessed’,
‘managed’, ‘controlled’, ‘sanitised’ and ‘commodified’ by organisations for their own
ends, and often at the expense of the employee (Sturdy & Fineman, 2001; Fineman,
2000b, 2004, 2005; Hochschild, 1983; Zembylas, 2006).
In the context of organisational change, Vince (2006) and Antonacopoulou and
Gabriel (2001) point out that meanings and emotions emerge during change events that
are shaped by political, social and cultural forces. Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006) and
Turnbull (1999) have documented in qualitative studies how employees were expected
to show or hide certain emotions during periods of change.
The social construction of emotions will be discussed in other parts of the
literature review, in particular the section on emotional labour, and also in Chapter 3 on
methodology.
Overview of perspectives on emotions
The different approaches summarised above demonstrate the wide diversity of views on
the nature of emotion and reflect the interests, and sometimes the ideologies, of the
disciplines from which they originate. Craib (1995), for example, writes that as both
psychotherapist and sociologist he has problems with certain social constructionist
views that emotions can only be understood from a sociological perspective. Gabriel
19
(1998) has also pointed to the weaknesses of a social construction reading of emotions,
which he says inadequately addresses the origins of emotions and the reasons specific
emotions are associated with different contexts. Fineman (2005) refers to paradigm
tensions in the study of emotions and Sturdy (2003, p. 97) comments that using a
multidisciplinary approach will result in a deeper understanding of a complex field but
also warns of the “danger that tensions between perspectives remain unacknowledged.”
Küpers and Weibler (2008) have developed a model that integrates individual and
social forces that influence the internal experience of emotions and their outward
manifestation, in organisational settings. The various approaches to the study of
emotions can thus both confront and complement each other.
For the purpose of this thesis the most important issues will revolve around the
ways in which employees interpret the events that affect them. Emotions are intensely
personal phenomena. While they may have dispositional and physiological properties
they are also derived from cognitive and social processes. In the methodology section I
will elaborate on my choice of a social constructionist approach, blended with a
cognitive perspective, to this study of the emotions of organisational change.
Presented next are two major themes that have emerged in emotions research:
the concept of basic or discrete emotions, and the use of various typologies that are used
to analyse the dimensions of emotions.
Basic and Discrete Emotions
Over the years one of the major debates in the study of emotions has been about the
concept of discrete and basic emotions. Issues include the number and nature of separate
emotions, which are basic and therefore subsume related emotions, the criteria for
categorisation as basic, and the antecedents and consequences of emotions.
Typologies of emotions can include hundreds of affect-related terms (Shaver,
Schwartz, Kirson & O’Connor, 1987). Many can be grouped together, for example,
anxiety, fear and fright, or joy, delight and happiness. A set of basic emotions with their
combinations, according to Ortony et al. (1988), will account for all identified emotions.
A classification of emotions as basic serves a number of purposes. Firstly, it simplifies a
vast and confusing field. Secondly, it provides a common language for the
understanding of a part of human nature. Thirdly, it facilitates the scientific
investigation of emotion and specifically the development of measures of emotions.
Unfortunately there is little agreement among psychologists as to what
20
constitutes a basic emotion (Ortony et al., 1988; Turner & Ortony, 1992). In Ekman and
Davidson (1994) five authors attempt to answer the editors’ question: Are there basic
emotions? Two say yes and three say no. Taking a physiological perspective Panksepp
(1994b) suggests that emotions can be classified in terms of common neural circuit
characteristics. Ekman (1994b) argues that common emotions can be found across many
cultures and that a classification of emotions into basic families can be achieved if they
meet certain criteria. Scherer (1994) refers to research across cultures that reveals lack
of specific correlations in the terms used to label emotions. Similarly, Shweder (1994)
asserts that that there are too many linguistic differences across countries and cultures to
enable researchers to decide on a definitive grouping. Averill (1994) argues that there
are too many ways in which emotions can be categorised to settle on one best format,
and even if this were possible, there is little point in doing so.
Theorists who argue in favour of a concept of basic emotions have provided not
merely a rationale for the classification process, but also for why and how their lists
meet these criteria. For example, Ekman (1994b, p. 18) uses the following criteria
against which to judge the inclusion of an emotion as basic, “automatic appraisal,
commonalities in antecedent events, presence in other primates, quick onset, brief
duration, unbidden occurrence and distinctive physiology.” Lazarus and Cohen-Charash
(2001) admit that their list of the most important emotions is a subjective one. Shaver et
al. (1987) surveyed 112 students by asking them to group 135 emotions and found that
they could be combined into six prototypical categories.
Table 1 includes a number of approaches to the classification of basic emotions,
grouped into positive and negative emotions. The order in which items are presented by
the authors has been altered to identify common items. In the five lists the most
common emotions were anger (5), fear (4), joy (4) and disgust (3). While one author
might be content with the use of one word, for example, anger, others might add words
such as contempt and disgust. The inclusion of surprise in a list of emotions is
controversial. Shaver et al. (1987) query whether it can be classified as a basic emotion.
Ortony et al. (1988) argue that surprise is not an emotion at all; it is a cognition that
generates an emotion, either positive (e.g. pleasure) or negative (e.g. fear). In an
empirical study Gibson (1995), however, found respondents overwhelmingly regarded
surprise as negative. Nevertheless, as Table 1 indicates, several authors do list it as a
basic emotion. A number of other authors have also engaged in the debate (see Ortony
et al., 1988 and Plutchik, 1994 for additional references). Several authors have referred
21
Table 1: Basic emotions
Izard (1992)
10
Plutchik (1994)
8
Ekman (1994)
6
Shaver et al. (1987)
6
Lazarus (1993)
15
Lazarus & Cohen - Charash
(2001) 15 relief
interest
hope hope
love love love
joy joy joy joy
happiness happiness
anticipation
acceptance
pride pride
compassion compassion
gratitude
surprise surprise surprise surprise
fear fear fear fear
anxiety anxiety
fright fright
distress
sadness sadness sadness sadness sadness
guilt guilt guilt
anger anger anger anger anger anger
disgust disgust disgust disgust
contempt
shame shame shame
jealousy jealousy
envy envy
22
to emotion blends. These are combinations of emotions leading to further emotions. For
example, reproach and distress lead to anger (Ortony et al., 1988), hurt is a combination
of sadness and anger (Shaver et al., 1987), fear and disgust lead to shame (Plutchik,
1994).
Ortony et al. (1988) have queried whether the identification of basic emotions,
while simplifying a vast field, serves a useful purpose. Plutchik (1994) concludes his
review of basic emotions by suggesting that the lack of agreement is not significant and will not hamper further research into emotions. What has been of greater utility for
quantitative studies of emotion is the development of measures that encapsulate the
most commonly experienced emotions. These will be discussed in the next section. The
debate has sharpened the knowledge of researchers, both quantitative and qualitative, of
fine distinctions, such as between fear and anxiety, or shame and embarrassment, and
between what Ortony and Turner (1990) label as biologically primitive emotions, such
as fear, which are found in all people, and psychologically primitive social emotions,
such as shame, which are more culturally specific.
Emotional Dimensions
Parallel to the exploration of basic emotions by psychologists has been a heated debate
concerning the dimensions of emotions. Having reviewed 359 articles in the Journal of
Personality and Social Psychology from 1991 to 1997, Russell and Feldman Barrett
(1999) pointed out that most discussed the structure of emotion but that there was
considerable disagreement on the nature of the structure, in particular, whether emotions
are measurable on unipolar or bipolar scales.
Several authors have depicted the structure of emotions in the form of a
circumplex, which seeks to explain the occurrence of emotions along a number of axes,
notably pleasantness and degrees of arousal or activation. Three of these are shown in
Figure 1, Emotion Circumplexes. A number of emotions are identified with like
emotions grouped near each other with correlates at 90 degrees and opposites at 180
degrees. For example, the positive emotion of happiness and the negative emotion of
fear can refer to higher or lower degrees of arousal.
Russell (1980) developed a circumplex model with axes of pleasure and arousal.
Scales are bipolar, for example, the opposite of happiness is sadness. Nearly two
decades later the model of Russell and Feldman Barrett (1999) contains two concepts.
In the inner circle, “core affect refers to consciously accessible elemental processes of
23
pleasure and activation, has many causes and is always present” (p. 805). In the outer
circle are prototypical emotion episodes, in which a discrete emotion, or a blend of
emotions, is triggered by a specific event.
Watson and Tellegen (1985) also developed a circumplex model which has four
axes. Along the dotted lines are axes for pleasantness and engagement and along the
solid lines are two axes identifying positive affect and negative affect. Items in the same
octant are highly positively correlated while those 45 degrees apart are moderately
correlated, those 90 degrees apart are uncorrelated and those 180 degrees apart are
opposite in meaning and highly negatively correlated. Pleasant and unpleasant emotions
are at opposite ends of the same (bipolar) scale (e.g. happy-unhappy), but affect scales
are unipolar - the opposite of high positive affect (e.g. elated, enthusiastic) is low
positive affect (e.g. drowsy, dull), not negative affect. High negative affect is evident
when a person is distressed, fearful or hostile, whereas low negative affect is
characterised by one who is calm and relaxed. The model of Larsen, Diener and Lucas
(2002) has a similar structure to that of Watson and Tellegen (1985) but uses slightly
different terms.
While other circumplex models have been presented (see Russell and Feldman
Barrett, 1999, for an overview), the mostly hotly debated issue has been the concept of
affect terms being measured on unipolar or bipolar scales. Watson and Tellegen (1985)
asserted the independence of PA and NA. In this article and subsequent articles (Watson
et al., 1988; Watson & Clark, 1997; Watson & Tellegen, 1999; Tellegen, Watson &
Clark, 1999; Watson, Wiese, Vaidya & Tellegen, 1999), they repeatedly provided
empirical evidence that they believe supports this claim and refutes criticism of their
model and competing interpretations of their results. Similarly, Russell and his
colleagues (Russell & Feldman Barrett, 1999; Russell & Carroll, 1999) and Green,
Goldman and Salovey (1993) have conducted their own empirical investigations which
they maintain support their position that affect is essentially bipolar in nature.
The debate as to whether positive and negative affect are the opposite poles of
one dimension, or two independent concepts, each with a high and low pole, is not
merely one of semantics. Each camp has pointed to what they see as methodological
flaws in the research of the other. However, they also grudgingly acknowledge that
there is some area of agreement. For example, Tellegen et al. (1999) suggest that some
feelings mark opposite poles in a bipolar structure (such as happiness and sadness),
while PA and NA are relatively independent. Similarly, Russell and Feldman Barrett
24
Larsen, Diener & Lucas (2002)
Russell & Feldman Barrett (1999)
Watson & Tellegen (1985)
Figure 1: Emotion Circumplexes
25
(1999) indicate that there are some areas of agreement, for example, on the basic
structure of emotions, even though different terms are used.
In his introduction to the special section on the structure of emotion in the
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, Diener (1999, p. 804) sums up the debate
by pointing out that “some consensus is emerging” - circumplex models are widely
accepted as a concept of affect, with pleasantness and unpleasantness on one axis and
degrees of activation or engagement on the other. Clarity of terms is essential. Watson
et al. (1999) changed their terms PA and NA to represent high positive or negative
activation, instead of the terms previously used, affect, or affectivity, which they
acknowledge are too broad to capture the essence of a mood state. The construction of
instruments to measure emotions needs to be carefully scrutinised so that researchers
agree whether the dimensions of emotions are accurately described (Russell & Carroll,
1999; Watson & Clark, 1997).
Reference to circumplex models has occasionally entered the literature on
organisational change. For example Lines (2005) conceptualises the emergence of
pleasant and activation dimensions in affective responses to organisational change and
Bartunek, Rousseau, Rudolph and De Palma (2006) tested for pleasantness and
activation in a study on nurses and participation in a new governance initiative.
Affect Measures
While the exact number of basic emotions will still be debated, and the arguments over
unipolarity/bipolarity and the nature of items and axes in circumplexes will continue, of
equal importance are ways of capturing and measuring emotions and moods. Various
methodological approaches can be used. Scales do not necessarily engage in the issue of
whether emotions are basic are not. The purpose is usually to allow respondents to
identify what the authors believe are the most commonly occurring emotions.
Some researchers have developed instruments to record emotions experienced
by people in every day contexts while some have focused on organisational settings. For
example, Watson et al. (1988) used 20 items in their Positive and Negative Affect
Schedules (PANAS), Van Katywk, Fox, Spector and Galloway (2000) identify 30
emotions in their Job-related Affective Well-being Scale (JAWS) and Fisher’s (1997)
Job Emotion Scale (JES) contains 16 items, based on an analysis of typologies of
discrete emotions. Warr (1990) investigated affect at work in a broader context, using
measures of emotions as well as those for job competence, job aspiration and job carry-
26
Note that the order of items has been changed from those devised by the authors to facilitate comparison and to separate positive moods and emotions from the negative.
Table 2: Mood and Emotion Scales
Fisher (1997) JES 16
Watson et al. (1988) PANAS
20
Van Katwyk et al. (2000) JAWS
30
Warr (1990) Affective Well-
Being 12 strong
determined
optimistic optimistic
content pleased happy enjoying liking
content pleased happy at ease satisfied cheerful elated ecstatic calm relaxed
content relaxed cheerful calm
enthusiastic enthusiastic excited
enthusiastic excited energetic
enthusiastic
interested attentive alert active
inspired inspired proud proud proud worried
distressed scared afraid nervous jittery
frightened intimidated anxious
worried uneasy tense
embarrassed guilty ashamed
depressed depressed depressed irritable
upset annoyed
unhappy frustrated disappointed
gloomy frustrated miserable discouraged
gloomy miserable
angry hostile angry furious
disgusted disgusted bored confused fatigued
27
over (that is, from the work environment to the non-work environment). From his
circumplex of 32 emotions in four quadrants he used 12, three from each quadrant.
Table 2 show considerable similarity between the four scales, with the JAWS approach
providing a wider range of similar emotions. An even number of positive and negative
responses is allowed in each measure. The PANAS-X (Watson & Clark, 1994)
expanded the original 20 items of Watson et al. (1988) to 60 items, with the advice to
investigators who have time constraints to choose those that are most relevant. It should
be noted that the researchers sometimes refer to mood, sometimes to emotions and
sometimes simply to affect. Briner and Kiefer (2005) caution that this discrepancy is
confusing, yet Fisher (1997), while acknowledging the usefulness of the distinction,
points to the way in which mood and emotion influence each other and to the difficulty
in separating them at times. All four scales in the table are self-report based measures.
The PANAS scales measure responses in terms of the extent to which emotions have
been felt over a period of time whereas the JES, JAWS and Affective Well-being Scale
measure responses in terms of frequency of emotions experienced.
Payne (2001) provides an extensive review of a number of other instruments,
including those designed to measure a single discrete emotion, such as anger, envy,
jealousy and guilt. Various researchers have used instruments to specifically measure
emotional traits, rather than states. For example, Lerner and Keltner (2001) used two
scales to measure dispositional fear and two to measure dispositional anger.
While self-report measures are commonly used, a number of researchers have
commented that they provide at best a limited, and not always accurate, view of
experienced emotions and that multiple methods should be used (Larsen et al., 2002;
Diener, Smith & Fujita, 1995; Izard, 1992).
The measures referred to provide a range of alternatives for the design of a
quantitative methodology for the study of emotions during organisational change. The
purpose of presenting these scales here is to demonstrate the range of affect terms used
by various researchers and the rationales they have presented to devise instruments that
meaningfully capture what they see as the most commonly experienced emotions.
Some researchers have queried whether emotions can be captured in a
quantitative fashion that does not merely provide superficial information. Folkman and
Moskowitz (2000, 2004) dispute the ability of quantitative methods to produce more
than surface insights. Fineman (2004, 2005) comments at length on how the quantitative
approach to researching emotions has been the dominant mode of analysis, as it has in
28
other constructs in the social sciences. He complains that this privileges certain
understandings of the nature of emotion and ignores or reject others. One effect is that
that statistical presentations of emotions are “truncated” and “eviscerated” (Fineman
2004, p. 731), “produce phantom images” (Fineman, 2005, p. 14) and are unable to
reflect “the heat, the contradictions, the inchoateness of lived emotionality” (Fineman,
2005, p. 7).
Other Forms of Research into Emotion
Qualitative approaches have also been used in various branches of psychology and have
proved particularly helpful in understanding responses to organisational issues,
including change. The most common approach in this paradigm has been the interview
method (e.g. Wolfram Cox, 1997; Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2004; 2006; Poder, 2004;
Piderit, 2000; Vince, 2000). Focus groups have also been used (e.g. Dasborough, 2006;
N. Clarke, 2006). Trained observers are able to provide some insight into the occurrence
of emotions in others (Larsen et al., 2002), particularly in the interpretation of emotions
evidenced in facial expressions (Ekman, 1994) and in the occurrence of emotional
contagion (Barsade, 2002). Ethnographic approaches, embracing both observation and
interviews, have provided a contextually rich vein of material of the emotions of
organisational change (e.g. Turnbull, 1999; Huy, 2002; Poder, 2004). Textual analysis
of interview and questionnaire data has also been deployed to capture the experience of
emotion in quantitative form (e.g. Mossholder, Settoon, Armenakis & Harris, 2000;
Dasborough, 2006). Diary studies have provided insight into the daily experience of
emotion at work (e.g. Grandey, Tam & Brauberger, 2002; Conway & Briner, 2002).
The analysis of drawings as a means of interpreting responses to change has been done
by Vince and Broussine (1996) and Eilam and Shamir (2005). Biological measures have
been used to measure emotions (Payne, 2001, King 2001; Larsen, 2002), but while they
provide organisational researchers with a broader perspective of the bases of emotion,
they offer little insight into the causes and consequences of emotional responses to
organisational issues.
Emotions and Change
Using theory from psychoanalysis, French (2001, p. 482) points out that many forms of
change involve uncertainty and those who have what the poet Keats termed ‘negative
capability’ are able to “tolerate ambiguity and paradox” since they have the “capacity to
29
integrate mental and emotional states” and consequently adapt their behaviour. Using a
similar approach Carr (2001) puts forward the Freudian view that identity is laced with
emotionality and claims that change can dislodge that identity and produce a reaction
akin to grieving. Based on a comparison of various models of individual change, Elrod
and Tippett (2001) refer to the many emotions that erupt in a rollercoaster ride through
positive and negative cognitive and affective states.
Changes in many facets of a person’s life are experienced over time. These
could include family, housing, education, social relationships, health and work. One
stress and coping instrument includes 72 items on recent life changes (including work),
recent health issues and emotions (Rahe, Veach, Tolles & Murkami, 2000). Affect
accompanies most change as people see gains and losses. Detailing a school-based
programme for helping children deal with change, loss and grief from events such as
death, parental separation or divorce, Graham (2004) reports on children expressing
feelings such as sadness, anger, loneliness and fright. Positive emotions were also found
in certain aspects of the programme. In analysing radical change in a community
setting, Fiol and O’Connor (2002) suggested that emotional reactions often overrode
cognitive appreciation of the need for change. According to them radical change usually
impacts negatively on individual, group, organisational and community identity, and
threatens to produce negative emotions and resistance.
Emotions in Organisations
The Role of Emotions in Organisational Life
Most, but not all, of the literature review so far has been concerned with broad areas of
social psychology. I now turn my attention to the role of emotion in organisations. I will
return to the debate on the functional versus disruptive elements of emotions, and then
examine the concepts of emotional regulation, emotional labour, emotional dissonance
and emotional contagion. Emotional intelligence will be highlighted in a separate
section.
In the 1990s there was considerable criticism of the relative dearth of research
into emotions in organisational life (Fineman, 1993a; Ashforth & Humphrey, 1995;
Briner, 1999; Domagalski, 1999). This paralleled complaints that affect had been under-
researched in broader areas of social psychology (e.g. Frijda, 1988). While the lament
on organisational applications has continued into the new millennium (e.g. Muchinsky,
2000), it has abated somewhat with the publication of a range of volumes on the topic
30
(e.g. Ashkanasy, Härtel & Zerbe, 2000; Ashkanasy, Zerbe & Härtel, 2002; 2005;
2006; Härtel, Zerbe & Ashkanasy, 2005; Härtel, Ashkanasy & Zerbe, 2007;
Fineman, 2000a, 2003, 2005; 2008; Lord, Klimoski & Kanfer, 2002; Payne &
Cooper, 2001), together with special editions on emotions in organisations in a
number of journals, and a wide variety of journal articles and book chapters.
Emonet, the Emotions in Organizations Network, started by Neal Ashkanasy at the
University of Queensland in Australia, has hosted bi-ennial conferences since
1998, and the organisers (Ashkanasy, Zerbe and Härtel) edit the books (referred to
earlier) that appear after the conferences. The Emonet email list, which provides
information and debate on emotions in organisations, has over 700 members
(Emonet, 2008). Books or book chapters have also appeared on special aspects of
work-based emotions, such as on emotional intelligence (e.g. Matthews, Zeidner &
Roberts, 2003, 2007; Druskat, Sala & Mount, 2006) and emotional labour (e.g.
Mann, 1999b; Bolton, 2005) and special editions of journals have also added to the
rapidly growing body of knowledge in these sub-fields. To show how much the
tide has turned Elfenbein (2007) suggests that “Emotion has now become one of
the most popular - and popularized - areas within organizational scholarship” (p.
315), and that this has led “to a near explosion of interest in the topic” (p. 316).
As in broader areas of social psychology, and in common parlance, emotionality
has been considered the opposite of rationality (Lazarus, 1991, 1995). The rational-
bureaucratic perspective has also dominated organisational studies (Vince, 2006). Ritzer
(1998, p. vii) claims that the ‘McDonalization’ of society is an acceleration of
rationality, bringing “an increase in efficiency, predictability, calculability and control
through the substitution of non-human for human technology.” Organisations have
conventionally been seen as “rationally ordered, appropriately structured, and emotion-
free life spaces, where the right decisions are made for the right reasons by the right
people, in a reliable and predictable manner” (Kersten, 2001, p. 452). In reviewing the
role of emotion in organisational life, Domagalski (1999) points to a strong tradition in
which emotions have been viewed as irrational, illogical, disruptive and chaotic. In
contrast, mechanistic approaches to organisational life have focused on order, precision,
routinisation and predictability. Putnam and Mumby (1992) suggest that rationality has
been typically defined in glowing terms as intentional, reasoned and focused on the
achievement of goals, qualities essentially linked to male stereotypes, while emotion has
been marginalised, trivialised and devalued - and denigrated as feminine. Weber (1968,
31
p. 975), in expounding on the principles of bureaucracy, maintains that organisational
efficiency is heightened “the more it is ‘dehumanised’, the more it succeeds in
eliminating from official business love, hatred, and purely personal, irrational and
emotional elements which escape calculation.” Even writing about emotion has been
subjected to cultural constructions of appropriateness and Tierney (2003, p. 310) goes
as far as to suggest that “Western epistemology was shaped by the belief that emotion
needed to be cut out of the process of knowledge production.”
“Yet, one only has to scratch the surface of organizational life,” claims Gabriel
(1998, p. 293), “to discover a thick layer of emotions, at times checked, at times
feigned, at times timidly expressed, at other times bursting out uncontrollably.” In
highlighting the need for research into affect in organisations, Fineman (1993b, p. 9)
describes organisations as emotional arenas where “feelings contribute to, and reflect,
the culture and structure.” Taking a social constructionist approach he maintains that
feelings are shaped by the social milieus in which people live and work. In an effort to
make meaning of their workplaces employees take cues from a variety of stimuli and
process these experiences in cognitive and affective ways. “Cognition and emotions
intertwine; ideas are laden with feelings, feelings contain ideas” (p. 16). Similarly,
Ashforth and Humphrey (1995, p. 98) maintain that “the experience of work is saturated
with feeling.”
Lazarus’ (1993) cognitive appraisal theory has been incorporated into
organisational models and tested empirically. Cropanzano, Weiss, Suckow and Grandey
(2000) hypothesised that primary appraisal occurs, and emotions are elicited, when
individuals evaluate the consequences for themselves of organisational decisions.
Secondary appraisal takes place, and possibly a different set of emotions arise, when the
outcomes are interpreted in terms of attributions of cause, particularly when employees
evaluate the fairness of the processes used to make the decisions. In two empirical
studies they tested for the occurrence of four discrete emotions - guilt, pride, sadness
and anger - and found that the emotions depended on a combination of perceived
favourability of outcome and perceived justice. They were not convinced that appraisal
theory and justice theory fitted comfortably side by side and proposed a model that
more clearly addresses the different appraisal processes that generate emotions and
perceptions of fairness. Paterson and Härtel’s (2002) model of cognitive and affective
responses to downsizing starts with primary appraisal of the process, and the potential
outcomes for the individual. Secondary appraisal includes attribution of cause, which,
32
viewed through the lens of organisational justice, produces anxiety, and contemplation
of coping strategies. Huy (1999) incorporates appraisal and coping theories in
describing the relationship between emotional intelligence and organisational change.
In a recent review of affect in organisations, Barsade and Gibson (2007)
comment on its application to organisational culture, group dynamics, conflict,
leadership, decision making, creativity and prosocial behaviour, but made no reference
to organisational change - which is unsurprising given the relative dearth of research in
this area. Briner (1999) claims that organisational constructs of motivation, leadership,
career management and change cannot be understood if emotions are excluded.
Fineman (1993b), Ashforth and Humphrey (1995), Beyer and Nino (2001) and Pizer
and Härtel (2005) have pointed to the role of organisational culture in eliciting emotions
and yet simultaneously seeking to repress them. To change traditional organisational
approaches, Huy (1999) argues for the development of emotional capability - the
capacity of an organisation to legitimise emotions and emotional displays. The
relationships between emotion and job satisfaction have been explored by Weiss and
Cropanzano (1996) and Wright and Staw (1999), and between emotions and stress by
Lazarus (1999) and Muchinsky (2000). Emotions have penetrated research into
organisational change, organisational justice, the psychological contract, leadership and
trust. Fuller reviews of these constructs will be found in the relevant sections of this
chapter.
Weiss and Cropanzano (1996) have attempted to develop the broadest approach
to emotions in organisational life in their Affective Events Theory, which analyses the
structure, causes and consequences of work-related emotions. The essence of their
theory is that events at work generate affective reactions that have significant
implications for attitudes and behaviour. While the theory deals with the distinctions
between emotion, mood and disposition, it indicates that single events, and a pattern of
events over time, need careful analysis so that their implications for individuals, groups
and organisations can be assessed.
Basch and Fisher (2000) define an affective event as an incident that results in
an appraisal of, and an emotional reaction to, a job-related agent (such as a supervisor or
colleague), an object or an event. In a survey of hotel employees they adapted Fisher’s
(1997) Job Emotion Scale to identify the emotional causes and consequences of
affective work-related events. The most highly reported incidents of positive events
were goal achievement, recognition and acts of colleagues, while the most frequently
33
cited negative events were acts of colleagues and acts of management. This allowed
them to develop matrices of discrete positive emotions and positive events and negative
emotions and negative events.
Brief and Weiss (2002) believe that studies of affect at work have focused on
mood and neglected to investigate discrete emotions. The latter line of research is,
however, emerging. For example, Fitness (2000) and Aquino, Douglas and Martinko
(2004) have tested for anger in the workplace, Kiefer (2002a), specifically examined
fear, joy and anger during a merger and Bagozzi, Verbeke and Gavino (2003)
investigated shame. In the context of organisational justice, Cropanzano et al. (2001)
explored four emotions, guilt, pride, sadness and anger, and Williams (1999) found
evidence of happiness, sadness and anger.
It is clear from the above that the experience of emotion is an undeniable aspect
of organisational life. Two parallel and almost contradictory lines of research have
focused on the experience and expression of emotion at work. While many writers have
commented on how the expression of emotion has been frowned on by management,
(see Fineman, 1993a, 2000a), a significant amount of attention has been paid by
researchers to the emotions employees are expected to demonstrate in their jobs (Mann,
1995; Bolton, 2005; Smollan 2006c). This literature review therefore next engages in
the topics of emotional regulation, emotional labour, emotional dissonance and
emotional contagion.
Emotional Regulation
Emotions are often difficult to control, advises Lazarus (2006), particularly when they
are intense. Emotional regulation is a concept that crosses various sub-disciplines in
psychology and is defined by Gross (1998, p. 275) as “the processes by which
individuals influence which emotions they have, when they have them, and how they
experience or express them.” He suggests that there are five stages in the process of
emotion generation at which emotion can be regulated: the selection of the situation to
be regulated, the modification of the situation, the investment of attention to the
situation, cognitive change and the control of the response. Kanfer and Kantrowitz
(2002) point to several methods by which people regulate their emotions, such as
cognitive processing, meditation, enhancing self-efficacy, suppression, venting and
seeking social support.
The literature on emotional regulation borrows from the evolutionary tradition,
34
which sees emotions as adaptive mechanisms to environmental stimuli (Cosmides &
Tooby, 2000); the cognitive tradition, which is based on the concept of the individual
consciously appraising an emotion-eliciting event and responding to it (Scherer 1999);
and the physiological tradition, according to which individuals react spontaneously to
events and produce, or control, emotions that will facilitate survival (Panksepp, 1994a;
Ledoux, 1994). Gross (1998) sees emotional regulation on a continuum from conscious
to unconscious and automatic. Emotional regulation fits well with the concept of
emotional intelligence (to be discussed at length later) in which the adaptive responses
of people to emotional situations are viewed as abilities (Mayer & Salovey, 1997) or
traits (Perez, Petrides & Furnham, 2005) or both (Goleman, 1998b; Bar-On, 1997), that
can be used to manage the emotions of self and others.
Emotional regulation has been studied in the context of organisational behaviour
to shed light on how employees manage emotional responses to work-related stimuli.
Much of this literature deals with the construct of emotional labour.
Emotional Labour
The term emotional labour was coined by Hochschild (1983, p. 7) in a book
appropriately called The Managed Heart, to describe the process by which employees
engage in “the management of feeling to create a publicly observable facial and bodily
display.” She distinguishes between two types. In surface acting a modicum of emotion
is called for. The employee can simulate the emotion for the benefit of the recipient, or
to be observed as acting correctly by supervisors or peers. Deep acting occurs when
considerable energy needs to be expended to display required emotions, so that it almost
becomes natural. Studies in emotional labour are based on display rules (Ekman, 1973)
which reinforce the assertion that much of emotion is socially-constructed (Fineman,
1993b; Callahan, 2002; Zembylas, 2006).
Ashforth and Humphrey (1993) focus more on the actual display of emotion
than the management of feelings. Morris and Feldman (1996, p. 987) propose a more
elaborate definition, “the effort, planning and control needed to express organisationally
desired emotions during interpersonal transactions.” Mann (1999a) points to different
conceptualisations of emotional labour as the effort required to produce the required
display and the actual display itself. Her definition encompasses both aspects: emotional
labour is “the state that exists when there is a discrepancy between the emotional
demeanour that an individual displays because it is considered appropriate, and the
35
emotions that are genuinely felt but would be inappropriate to display” (p. 353).
Hochschild (1983) distinguishes between emotional labour, which is sold for a
wage, and emotion work, which involves the same processes but in a private context.
Zapf (2002). however, uses the term emotion work to encompass actions that require
interaction with clients, displaying of emotions to alter others’ emotions and the
displaying of emotions to conform to organisational rules. Similarly, Strazdins (2002)
uses the term emotional work to refer to the behaviours needed to satisfy role demands
and to alter others’ feelings. As discussed earlier emotional regulation (Gross, 1998) is a
broader concept, encompassing how individuals experience, express and control
emotions in a variety of social contexts. The most comprehensive treatment of the
subject of work-based emotional labour has been presented by Bolton (2005). Her
typology of emotion management identifies four categories: pecuniary (the exchange of
emotional labour for a wage, and thereby serving organisational ends), prescriptive
(influenced by professional and organisational feeling rules), presentational (based on
wide-spread social norms) and philanthropic (the extra effort that goes into the creation
and/or maintenance of relationships).
There are multiple perspectives of the suitability of emotional expression and
suppression - society, industry, profession, organisation, group, gender and individual
(Smollan, 2006c). National and ethnic settings of the organisation influence what is
considered acceptable by way of public display (Syed, 2008; Tan, Foo, Chong & Ng,
2003; Bagozzi et al., 2003; Sutton & Rafaeli, 1988; Rafaeli & Sutton, 1987; 1990).
Industry norms have been shown to be relevant, particularly in most service-oriented
jobs where employees are expected to display appropriate emotions, such as
pleasantness or warmth (Sharpe, 2005; Mulholland, 2002; Rafaeli & Sutton; 1987;
1990), but in dealing with debt collection, expression of the negative emotions such as
irritation or anger would be considered appropriate (Sutton, 1991). Certain professions
like law (Lively, 2000; Harris, 2002), academia (Bellas, 1999) and those found in
healthcare (Mann, 2005; Larson & Yao, 2005) have been found to require considerable
degrees of emotional labour. Managers have also been labelled as professionals by
academics (e.g. Fournier, 1999) and by organisations that represent them, such as the
New Zealand Institute of Management (2008) and the Australian Institute of
Management (2008). From an occupational perspective, Hochschild’s (1983)
classification of work roles into occupations revealed that the second largest category
was managers and administrators. Yet little attention that has been paid to managerial
36
emotional labour. This is surprising given that emotions surface in power and authority
relationships (Poder, 2004). In a survey of 238 employees Brotheridge and Grandey
(2002) identified 15 managers who reported a high mean level of emotional labour, but
lower than that of service workers. Fitness (2000) found that anger was mainly due to
clashes with supervisors, subordinates or colleagues. People who possess power are
often able to influence the expression of emotions or suppression of emotional display
in others (Tiedens, Ellsworth & Mequita, 2000). Ethnicity and nationality underpin
perceptions of the nature of power (Mondillon, Niedenthal, Brauer, Rohmann, Dalle &
Uchida, 2005). Conflict situations call for the expression and control of emotions in
appropriate ways (Toerien & Kitzinger, 2007; Jordan & Troth, 2002). Managers are
expected to display anger when subordinates break rules or deliver poor performance
yet they may not experience the emotions of anger and frustration that their own
supervisors expect them to display. Similarly, they may feel sympathy, sadness or guilt
when subordinates are made redundant but may be expected to repress these emotions.
The way in which an organisation approaches emotional labour becomes a
feature of the organisational culture (Pizer & Härtel, 2005). Schein’s (1990, p. 111)
definition of organisational culture includes the practice of teaching members “the
correct way to perceive, think and feel.” Emotional labour has been captured in Ritzer’s
(1998) term, ‘McDonaldization’, particularly in the need to espouse the ‘have a nice
day’ mantra. Van Maanen and Kunda (1989) and Martin, Knopoff and Beckman (1998)
have documented the vastly different ways in which Disney and The Body Shop
manage emotions at work, with the former making specific demands on its employees
and the latter encouraging a more authentic form of emotional expression.
Gender has also played a role in perceptions of what is considered the
appropriate expression or hiding of emotion (Mumby & Putnam, 1992; Lively, 2000;
Larson & Yao, 2004; Mulholland, 2002). Many industries, professions and jobs are
heavily staffed with women in what Guy and Newman (2004) refer to as ‘pink-collar’
roles and where care and nurturing are expected (Bellas, 1999). In a study of managers
and professionals Simpson and Stroh (2004) found that women were less likely than
men to display negative emotions or to hide positive ones.
The lack of attention to the emotional labour required in group settings is a
surprising omission. Employees often feel emotions, such as anger, sympathy or
anxiety, that are directed at colleagues and the appropriate expression of these emotions
in ways accepted by the group is now emerging in the literature (Brotheridge &
37
Grandey, 2002; Dieffendorff & Richard, 2003; Lively, 2002; Côté, 2005; Pescosolido,
2005).
In addition to these multiple forces, individual values, personality and emotional
intelligence influence the extent to which the demonstration or suppression of emotions
becomes labour and how they are managed. Syed (2008) argues that emotional labour
may conflict with an individual’s moral values. From a dispositional perspective
positive affectivity has been linked to extraversion (Watson et al., 1988) and people
with these characteristics will generally find it easier to display positive emotions in
organisational settings (Tan et al., 2003). Dieffendorff and Richard (2003) report that
employees with negative affectivity perceive an implicit rule to hide negative emotions
but not to display positive ones. People who are higher in emotional intelligence are
more able to deal with the demands of emotional labour (Prati & Perrewé, 2006).
There are many other factors that influence how acceptable emotional
expression may be. For example, it is believed that it is mostly positive emotions that
are welcomed while negative emotions need to be hidden (Diefendorff & Richard,
2003; Kramer & Hess, 2002; Erickson & Ritter, 2001; Gross, 1998). Negative emotions
can more easily be directed by managers to subordinates than in the other direction
(Tiedens et al., 2000; Mondillon et al., 2006). The frequency, intensity, duration and
variety of emotions displayed or suppressed on the job also contribute to individual
responses to the requirements of emotional labour (Morris & Feldman, 1996;
Brotheridge & Grandey, 2002; Zapf, 2002).
In the context of this thesis, the emotions that surface during organisational
change often need to be expressed or suppressed but little research has been done to
explore the relationship between emotional labour and organisational change. Bryant
and Wolfram Cox (2006) report that just over half of their non-management
respondents referred to the need to manage their emotions during various forms of
organisational change. Some participants, who had suffered a form of loss, were
explicitly told to control their emotions and were reprimanded, even in front of others, if
they failed to do so. For some, the emotional labour was as exhausting as the negative
emotions themselves. Turnbull (1999) studied cultural change in an organisation and
also reported many instances of middle managers feigning or hiding emotions. Both
studies found alienation, disengagement and feelings of inauthenticity.
Fox and Amichai-Hamburger (2001) indicate that the selling of change requires
managers to inject positive emotions into their appeals for employees to accept change.
38
If managers do not support the changes, and in particular, if they are experiencing
negative emotions, such as anger or anxiety, they would be expected to suppress them.
In overcoming the uncertainties that often accompany change, Mossholder et al. (2000,
p. 239) suggest that managers will need to communicate the benefits of change so that
the employees become “positively energized”. Since the words emotion and motivation
have the same Latin root word, emotere or emovere, to move, managers need to inject
emotion into their communication. Yet if they do so by means of surface acting
(Hochschild, 1979, 1983) they may experience emotional dissonance, and their
integrity, perceived by themselves and others, becomes compromised, leading to
feelings of shame and guilt (Turnbull, 1999).
Emotional Dissonance
One of the consequences of emotional labour is emotional dissonance. Hochschild
(1983) uses the term emotive dissonance to describe the dysfunctional impact on
employees of the strain that they feel in feigning emotions. She contends that this
dissonance, over time, leads to physical, mental and work-related problems. Empirical
data from other researchers provides conflicting evidence.
In a survey of service workers Morris and Feldman (1997) found that emotional
dissonance was positively related to task routineness and negatively related to job
autonomy, and that it resulted in job dissatisfaction and emotional exhaustion. In a study
of nurses Zerbe (2000) found no support for the hypothesis that the mismatch between
expected and felt emotions would result in job dissatisfaction, health problems, turnover
intentions or burnout. These negative consequences were due to felt emotions, rather
than any difference between felt emotions and those that organisations expected their
employees to display. In a second study of airline flight attendants and service staff he
similarly found that deviance between displayed and expected behaviour did not
negatively impact on employee well-being. Conversely, the display of positive emotion
increased well-being for some of the staff.
Schaubroeck and Jones (2000) sought to empirically test the physical symptoms
of emotional labour in a survey research company. They found that deleterious physical
symptoms manifested themselves when employees considered that the emotions they
needed to demonstrate in their jobs were not authentic. Their prediction that expressing
positive emotion would have a positive effect on health was not supported. The key
factor was the extent to which employees identified with their organisations, confirming
39
Ashforth and Humphrey’s (1993) view that this will determine how much of the
emotion they are expected to express actually constitutes labour. Similarly,
Schaubroeck and Jones (2000) found that those with lower levels of job involvement
reported more dissonance. A related factor is the disposition of the employee. They
predicted that employees high in positive affect would experience no dissonance when
called upon to display positive emotions or suppress negative emotions and, conversely,
people high in negative affect would experience considerable dissonance in doing so.
Their results supported the prediction for the display of negative emotions but not for
the display of positive emotions. Giardini and Freese (2006) found support for a
hypothesis that emotional competence, a term they prefer to emotional intelligence, and
which they conceive of as skill in regulation of own and others’ affect, moderates the
relationship between emotional work and emotional dissonance.
Emotional Contagion
Emotions as evidenced in facial expression (Ekman, 1994a), body language and written
and oral communication can easily be transmitted from one person to another, or to a
group (Hatfield, Cacioppo & Rapson, 1993). Emotional contagion can be a ‘primitive’
(automatic) process or one where there is stronger cognitive element (Hatfield et al.,
1993; Barsade, 2002). Both emotion and mood can be ‘catching’.
In an organisational context emotion and mood often occur in group settings and
a ‘ripple effect’ can easily take place (Barsade, 2002). In an experimental design
Barsade tested for high and low pleasantness and high and low energy, in accordance
with Russell’s (1980) circumplex model. She reported evidence of contagion of both
positive and negative emotion, but found that degrees of energy or arousal had mixed or
no effect on contagion. Johnson (2008) found a strong correlation between charismatic
leader affect and follower affect. In a study of nurses involved in an organisational
change, Bartunek et al. (2006) found evidence of emotional contagion in units where the
outcomes of change were perceived as favourable. Totterdell, Wall, Holman, Diamond
and Epitropaki (2004) also found evidence of emotional contagion in a merger. In
another study of nurses Strazdins (2002) found that the demands of emotional labour led
to emotional contagion and psychological distress. Integrating literature on emotional
contagion and burnout Bakker, Schaufeli, Sixma and Bosveld (2001) found
considerable ‘burnout contagion’ amongst general practitioners, even though these
professionals tend to work in small groups. Emotional contagion in organisations is not
40
merely a work group phenomenon; it is often a process of interaction between employee
and customer (Strazdins, 2002; Bakker et al., 2001).
Leaders are often able to generate emotions in others, both in dyadic and larger
group contexts. Pescosolido (2005, p. 321) proposes that leaders, formal and informal,
manage group emotions by “empathizing and identifying with the collective emotional
reaction of group members” and setting “the emotional tone for other group members to
adapt their own emotional responses.” He suggests that this is easier if emotional
expressiveness is a group norm and if leaders exhibit charisma. Charismatic leaders
often subconsciously or deliberately use emotion to generate action in small and large
groups (Wasielewski, 1985; Conger & Canungo, 1998). Group emotions generated in
organisational contexts need careful management for the benefit of employees and their
organisations. Frost (2004) calls skilled ‘toxin handlers’ those leaders who are able to
dissipate ‘poisonous’ emotions and spread positive affect. In the context of change, Huy
(2002) points to the need of middle managers to heighten some group emotions while
dampening others, so that there is a balance between the stability required for ongoing
processes and the dynamism needed for the new initiative. Sanchez-Burk and Huy
(2008) advise managers to be aware of both group and individual emotions.
Emotions and Organisational Change
The emotions of organisational change - their nature, antecedents and consequences -
are the subject of this study and are explored in depth in the development of the model,
which appears later on. Reference will be made there to studies investigating the
relationships between emotions, organisational change and constructs such as
leadership, trust, empathy, job satisfaction, organisational justice, the psychological
contract and organisational culture. A brief outline of the research is presented here.
Emotional responses to change are focused on both outcomes and processes.
Many authors (e.g. French, 2001; Dent & Goldberg, 1999; Fedor, Caldwell & Herold,
2006; Rafferty & Griffin, 2006), have noted the uncertainty that accompanies change
and the overriding emotion of anxiety that occurs because of it. Anxiety stems from a
variety of sources such as anticipated negative outcomes, possibilities of injustice and
inability to cope with aspects of the change. For example, Fineman (2003, p. 125)
suggests that: Consciously anxiety stems from the shame of not being able to learn new skills or new
ways, when others can. There is the embarrassment of failing to keep up with the
competitive colleagues or of being excluded from a peer group.
41
Yet change can deliver positive and/or negative outcomes and therefore positive
and/or negative emotions, “ranging from nostalgia to hope, from anxiety to resignation,
from anticipation to despondency” (Antonacopolou & Gabriel, 2001, p. 446). Carr
(1999, p. 580) refers to “frustration, suspicion, resistance, anger, grief and despair…joy,
glee, and hope.”
Given the likelihood of affective reactions to change, management needs to be
able to predict them and harness them effectively when they can. In the words of Duck
(1993, p. 113): Change is fundamentally about feelings; companies that want their workers to contribute
with their heads and their hearts have to accept that emotions are central to the new
management style…the most successful change programs reveal that large organisations
connect with their people most directly through values - and that values, ultimately are
about beliefs and feelings.
Kotter and Cohen (2002, p. 2) suggest in a book, aptly titled The Heart of Change, that: Changing behavior is less a matter of giving people analysis to influence their thoughts than
helping them to see a truth to influence their feelings. Both thinking and feeling are
essential, and both are found in organizations. But the heart of change is the emotions.
When Lou Gerstner took over as CEO of IBM in 1994 he was quoted in The
New York Times on the need for a cultural change: “It’s not something you do by
writing memos. You’ve got to appeal to people’s emotions. They’ve got to buy in with
their hearts and bellies, not just their minds” (cited in Barsade, 2002, p. 670).
Clearly, then, an appreciation of the emotional aspects of change should help
management deliver change more successfully. When one local government agency in
New Zealand moved to new offices it identified the need to take account of emotional
reactions (Brown, 2006). Among many change initiatives, all staff were offered the
opportunity of attending a workshop on the change and to express any anxieties they
had about it. People were invited to write the blocks (fears, anxiety, anger) onto pieces of card and make
these into a wall. They were then invited to write on balloons (hopes, advantages,
excitement) things that might remove or help to counteract the blocks (p. 16).
Brown recounts one person’s story of the move: That night when I got home I couldn’t stop crying and my husband wondered what on earth
was wrong with me, and so did I! Then it occurred to me that this was what you had been
on about when you talked about experiencing feelings of grief. I was glad then you had, so
I knew what I was experiencing was quite normal and I wasn’t losing the plot. I realised too
that all of the anger some people had was about the same sort of thing. They were probably
42
just unsure of how it would all be - like where they would park (p. 17).
It is not only managers, however, who benefit from understanding the emotional
nature of change. Employees also benefit from understanding and working with the
emotional nature of change - they are better able to cope, and work with others
experiencing organisational change. The key to this understanding is emotional
intelligence.
Emotional Intelligence (EI)
This section is organised as follows. Firstly, the construct of EI and the controversy
surrounding it are outlined. Secondly, the implications of EI for the workplace are
summarised. Thirdly, the role of EI in organisational change is explored.
EI - Construct and Controversy
The origins of the construct of EI are found in the concept of social intelligence outlined
by Thorndike (1920, cited in Mathews, Zeidner & Roberts, 2003), Gardner’s theory of
multiple intelligences (1983, 1993), which includes the concepts of intra- and
interpersonal intelligences, and Sternberg’s (1988) model of intelligence, which
embraces the concept of practical intelligence. While a detailed analysis of these
theories lies outside the scope of this study, it should be noted that the lack of empirical
evidence to support these constructs has been discussed by Matthews et al. (2003) and
Landy (2005).
Early references to the term EI have been found in an article by Leuner (1966,
cited in Bar-On, Handley & Fund, 2006) and in an unpublished thesis of Payne (1986,
cited in Matthews et al., 2003 and in Ashkanasy & Daus, 2005). However, the scientific
development of the construct lies in the seminal work of Salovey and Mayer (1990).
The popularisation of the concept by Goleman (1995) and its application to
organisations (Goleman, 1998a, 1998b) spurred the publication of many books (e.g.
Cooper & Sawaf, 1997; Weisinger, 1998), magazine and journal articles, and the
development of websites aimed at a general audience. It also started a heated debate
which continues today.
The first debate in the scientific community revolves around the question of
whether EI adds anything of value to established constructs of intelligence, ability and
personality (see for example a special edition of the Journal of Organizational
Behaviour, notably Ashkanasy & Daus, 2005; Daus & Ashkanasy, 2005; Landy, 2005;
43
Locke, 2005; Conte, 2005). The second lies in the competing claims made by the
developers of various models and instruments, with many researchers (e.g. Fineman,
2000b, 2004; Ashkanasy & Daus, 2005; Matthews et al., 2003) deriding the concepts
and claims of the allegedly less scientific authors. Ashkanasy and Daus (2005) complain
that critics of EI do not adequately distinguish between scientific and popular
constructions of EI.
Salovey and Mayer (1990, p. 189) defined EI as the “subset of social
intelligence that involves the ability to monitor one’s own and others feelings and
emotions, to discriminate among them and to use this information to guide one’s
thinking and actions” (authors’ italics). Several years later they refined the concept as
“the ability to perceive emotions, to access and generate emotions so as to assist
thought, to understand emotions and emotional knowledge, and to reflectively regulate
emotions so as to produce emotional and intellectual growth” (Mayer & Salovey, 1997,
p. 5). They also produced a model of EI (see Figure 2) which identifies these four
‘branches’, each with four sets of abilities, which reflect an increasing degree of
sophistication as they move from left to right and from the lowest branch to the highest
branch. The first and lowest branch, ‘perception, appraisal and expression of emotion’,
includes the abilities to identify one’s own feelings, and those of others, to express
emotions, and determine whether emotions are accurate and honest. The second branch,
‘emotional facilitation of thinking’, enables people to prioritise thinking, improve
memory and judgement, consider multiple perspectives, solve problems and think
creatively. At the third level, ‘understanding and analyzing emotions, employing
emotional knowledge’, are the abilities to label emotions, interpret the meanings they
represent, understand cause and effect, understand emotion blends and complex
feelings, and how they can change over time. The fourth and top level, ‘reflective
regulation of emotions to promote emotional and intellectual growth’, allows people to
stay open to positive and negative emotions, reflect on them in a detached way, monitor
their own emotions and those of others, and manage these emotions in themselves and
others.
The most important aspect of their definition and model is their construction of
EI as ability, which is notably different from the ‘mixed models’ (e.g. Goleman, 1995;
Bar-On, 1997), which include personality and other concepts which they believe are
unrelated to intelligence (Mayer, Salovey & Caruso, 2000, 2004).
44
4. Reflective Regulation of Emotion to Promote Emotional and Intellectual Growth
4.1 Ability to stay open to feelings, both those that are pleasant and those that are unpleasant.
4.2 Ability to reflectively engage or detach from an emotion depending upon its judged informativeness or utility.
4.3 Ability to reflectively monitor emotions in relation to oneself and others, such as recognizing how clear, typical, influential or reasonable they are.
4 4 Ability to manage emotion in oneself and others by moderating negative emotions and enhancing pleasant ones, without representing. or exaggerating any information they may convey.
3. Understanding and Analyzing Emotions; Employing Emotional Knowledge
3.1 Ability to label emotions and recognize relations among the words and the emotions themselves, such as the relation between liking and loving.
3.2 Ability to interpret the meanings that emotions convey regarding relationships, such as that sadness often accompanies a loss.
3.3 Ability to understand complex feelings: simultaneous feelings of love and hate or blends such as awe as a combination of fear and surprise.
3.4 Ability to recognize likely transitions such as the transition from anger to satisfaction or from anger to shame.
2. Emotional Facilitation of Thinking
2.1 Emotions prioritize thinking by directing attention to important information.
2.2 Emotions are sufficiently vivid and available that they can be generated as aids to judgment and memory concerning feelings.
2.3 Emotional mood swings change the individual's perspective from optimistic to pessimistic, encouraging consideration of multiple points of view.
2.4 Emotional states differentially encourage specific problem-solving approaches such as when happiness facilitates inductive reasoning and creativity.
1. Perception, Appraisal and Expression of Emotion
1.1 Ability to identify emotion in one's physical states, feelings, and thoughts.
1.2 Ability to identify emotions in other people, designs, artwork, etc. through language, sound, appearance, and behavior.
1.3 Ability to express emotions accurately, and to express needs related to those feelings.
1.4 Ability to discriminate between accurate and inaccurate, or honest vs. dishonest expressions of feeling.
Source: Mayer, J. & Salovey, P. (1997). What is emotional intelligence? In P. Salovey & D. Sluyter (Eds.) Emotional development and emotional intelligence: Educational
implications (pp. 3-31). New York: Basic Books. [Block numbers added for this thesis, e.g. 1.1, 1.2.]
Figure 2: Mayer and Salovey, 1997: The Four Branches of Emotional Intelligence
45
An early criticism of their concept by Davies, Stankov and Roberts (1998),
based on three empirical studies on emotional perception, concluded that EI was little
different to established concepts of personality and general intelligence and that valid
measures were needed to test it. An early self-report measure, based on the Mayer and
Salovey (1997) model, was developed by Schutte, Malouff, Hall, Haggerty, Cooper,
Golden and Dornheim (1998).
At about the same time Mayer and colleagues were developing their own
measure, the MEIS - the Multifactor Emotional Intelligence Test (Mayer, Caruso &
Salovey, 2000), which was superseded by the MSCEIT - the Mayer, Salovey, Caruso
Emotional Intelligence Test (Mayer, Salovey, Caruso & Sitarenios, 2003). The later
version arose from their own conceptualisation of the weaknesses of the MEIS (Mayer
at al., 2003) and in response to criticisms of its validity by other researchers (e.g.
Ciarrochi, Chan & Caputi, 2000; Roberts, Zeidner & Matthews, 2001). Despite
continuing criticism of some aspects of the MSCEIT (McEnrue & Groves, 2006; Conte,
2005; Van Rooy & Viswesvaran, 2004), the approach of Mayer and colleagues has been
considered the “gold standard” (Ashkanasy & Daus, 2003, p. 72), the “only strictly
valid model of emotional intelligence” (Daus & Ashkanasy, 2005, p. 463), “the most
cohesive and comprehensive” (Schutte et al., 1998, p. 169) and the “most defensible
model” (Jordan, 2005, p. 458). McEnrue and Groves (2006) rated the MSCEIT higher
in terms of five types of validity than three of the other main measures, those by
Goleman (1995), Bar-On (1997) and Dulewicz and Higgs (1999).
Goleman (1995) developed a mixed model in which he combines abilities (such
as recognising and managing one’s own emotions, recognising others’ emotions and
managing relationships) with concepts such as motivation and character. Various
authors have criticised Goleman’s view that all of these constructs represent a form of
intelligence (Mayer et al., 2000; Ashkanasy & Daus, 2005; Matthews et al., 2003;
McEnrue & Groves, 2006). However, it is his extravagant claims for the success EI can
deliver which have earned him an unusual degree of scorn (Fineman, 2000a; Matthews
et al., 2002; Landy, 2005). Goleman (1995) suggested, for example, that if general
intelligence or IQ counts for only 20 per cent of career success, then EI must account
for the balance; that EI counts for twice as much as IQ and technical skills (Goleman,
1998b); and that EI is the essential ingredient of leadership ability (Goleman, 1999a).
His critics complain that his assertions have little empirical basis and that the evidence
which does exist is held in proprietary databases and self-commissioned reports, and not
46
subjected to the rigour of peer-reviewed academic journals (Matthews et al., 2003;
Wilhelm, 2005; Landy, 2005; Conte, 2005).
His publications have been targeted at a general readership and he has been
lambasted for achieving commercial success at the expense of scientific verity (e.g.
Sternberg, 2001; Fineman, 2000b; Landy, 2005). Goleman has worked with academics
and a major international consultancy, the Hay Group, to develop the ECI (Emotional
Competence Inventory) (Hay Group, 2008). However, critics have claimed that it does
not provide any additional insights to tests of ability or personality (Conte, 2005;
McEnrue & Groves, 2006; Matthews et al., 2003).
Bar-On’s (1997) model of EI also combines abilities (some of which have little
direct relationship to emotions, such as problem solving), personality factors and
concepts such as flexibility and social responsibility. Critics say it lacks various forms
of validity (Conte, 2005; McEnrue & Groves, 2006). Matthews et al. (2003) found its
measures to be too similar to the Big Five model of personality (McCrae & Costa,
1987) to be considered a useful measure of EI. Nevertheless, it has been widely used
(Van Rooy & Viswesvaran, 2004; McEnrue & Groves, 2006; Bar-On et al., 2006).
Many other measures of EI (or what purports to be EI) have been developed.
Perez et al. (2005) have identified no fewer than 20 such measures. Some have been
specifically developed to measure workplace applications (Wong & Law, 2002; Jordan,
Ashkanasy, Härtel & Hooper, 2002b; Dulewicz & Higgs, 1999; Gardner & Stough,
2002).
While the ability model and measures of Mayer et al. (2004), despite their
alleged weaknesses, seem to have the greatest backing, it has been maintained that trait
models of EI actually measure something different to ability models, and in fact provide
considerable extra value over traditional models (and measures) of EI (Petrides &
Furnham, 2000, 2003; Petrides, Furnham & Mavroveli, 2007; Perez et al., 2005; Tett,
Fox & Wang, 2005). After a meta-analysis of 59 studies of EI (including unpublished
dissertations) Van Rooy and Viswesvaran (2004, p. 86) concluded that “emotional
intelligence and personality appear to be more highly correlated than many researchers
would prefer.” Vakola et al. (2004), using measures of personality from the Big Five
model and measures of EI from Mayer and Salovey’s (1997) ability model, found that
both ability EI and trait EI affected reactions to organisational change, and were distinct
but related constructs. Van der Zee and Wabeke (2004) concluded after conducting an
empirical study that trait EI is not sufficiently distinct from existing trait approaches.
47
What confounds the issue is that many personality traits are explained as capabilities by
researchers (e.g. Petrides et al., 2007). Thus while Ciarrochi et al. (2000) believe that
competing definitions of EI are more complementary than contradictory, not everyone
seems to agree. And others (e.g. Antonakis, 2004) still insist that empirical studies of EI
add little to extant knowledge of general intelligence or personality.
Another point that has caused much debate (e.g. Davies et al., 1998; MacCann,
Matthews, Zeidner & Roberts, 2003; Neubauer & Freudenthaler, 2005; Wilhelm, 2005)
is the reliance on self-report measures that characterise most EI instruments, with the
notable exception of the Mayer et al. measures (2001; 2003). Their view is that ability
can only be revealed by performance measures. Accordingly, the MEIS and MSCEIT
rely on consensus, expert and target scoring. While these last two instruments have not
escaped criticism on methodological grounds (Roberts et al., 2001; MacCann et al.,
2003; McEnrue & Groves, 2006), it has been proposed by the developers (Mayer et al.,
2001; 2003) that their model meets the criteria for a standard concept of intelligence and
that only performance instruments can measure it, a view echoed by Wilhelm (2005).
Self-reports, on the other hand, are considered more acceptable for trait measures (Perez
et al., 2005; Petrides & Furnham, 2000; MacCann et al., 2003), but are still subject to
the vagaries of memory, accuracy and self-concept (Mayer et al., 2000; Kang, Day &
Meara, 2005; Neubauer & Freudenthaler, 2005; Wilhelm, 2005), an issue common to all
emotional experience (Scherer, 1999; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2004; Feldman Barrett,
2004). Given the increasing importance accorded to the concept of EI in organisations,
employees may feel it beneficial to fake answers to create the ‘right impression’ (Van
Rooy & Viswevaran, 2004; Kang et al., 2005; Lopes, Côté & Salovey, 2006). Matthews
et al. (2003) believe that performance measures of EI will outlive personality measures.
However Perez et al. (2005) and Petrides and Furnham (2000, 2003) insist that trait EI
is a distinctly different concept to ability EI and should be measured by self-reports.
Implications of EI for the workplace
Useful overviews of EI in organisations have been provided by Jordan, Ashkanasy and
Ascough (2007), Barsade and Gibson (2007), Mayer, Roberts and Barsade (2008) and
Elfenbein (2007). Despite over 18 years of research into EI, Barsade and Gibson (2007,
p. 44) declare that “the research evidence tying emotional intelligence abilities to work
performance is still in its beginning phases” and that conclusions are therefore tentative.
A plethora of books or book chapters on work-based applications have been
48
targeted at general audiences (e.g. Caruso & Salovey, 2004; Goleman, 1998; Cherniss
& Goleman, 2001; Weisinger 1998), and some specifically at researchers (e.g. Druskat
et al., 2006; Matthews et al., 2003, 2007). Journal articles have focused on performance
(Daus & Ashkanasy, 2005; Abraham, 2004), conflict (Jordan & Troth, 2002), job
control (Abraham, 2000), organisational climate (Abraham, 2004), job insecurity
(Jordan et al. 2002a), organisational structure (Sy & Côté, 2003), teams (Wolff,
Pescosolido & Druskat, 2002; Abraham, 2004) and learning (N. Clarke, 2006). The
modest literature on EI and change will be explored in a separate section.
One of the most dominant - and contested - areas of research into EI in
organisations has explored the links between EI and leadership (e.g. Prati, Douglas,
Ferris, Ammeter & Buckley,
Conceptual and empirical studies have established links between
transformational leadership and EI. As the name indicates, transformational leadership
is essentially about change (Bass, Avolio, Jung & Berson, 2003). Bass (1985, 1999;
2002) identified four key characteristics: idealised influence (also known as charismatic
leadership), inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation and individualised
consideration, which can be measured with the Multifactor Leadership Questionnaire.
Each in some way can use emotional understanding and expression, particularly the
positive emotions of excitement, enthusiasm and hope, which will stimulate followers
into engaging in personal and organisational change. As one of the pioneers of the
concept of transformational leadership, Bass (2002) considers EI to be a combination of
ability and personality and his overview of research linking EI to leadership covers both
constructs. Other conceptual links between EI and transformational leadership have
been proposed by George (2000), Ashkanasy and Tse (2002), Prati et al. (2003) and
Brown and Moshavi (2005). Empirical work demonstrating the relationship between EI
and transformational leadership is beginning to mushroom (Barling, Slater & Kelloway,
2000; Mandell & Pherwani, 2003; Gardner & Stough, 2002; Palmer et al., 2000; Brown,
Bryant & Reilly, 2006).
2003; Antonakis, 2004; Pescosolido, 2005; Dulewicz &
Higgs, 2003). EI has been considered as a key factor in the success of leaders since it
helps them engage followers by understanding the emotional bases of behaviour at
work. This entails injecting emotion as a means of developing commitment,
understanding how individuals respond on an affective level to organisational dynamics
and responding appropriately.
Other theories of leadership have been applied to the concept of EI. Walter and
49
Bruch (2007) found that EI was related to charismatic leadership. The model Prati et al.
(2003) constructed indicates that leader EI, in tandem with follower EI, creates a
climate of cohesion and trust that leads to improved performance. Dulewicz and Higgs
(1999) developed a model for organisational studies that includes constructs of
intellectual intelligence, emotional intelligence and managerial intelligence, and
combines competencies and personality. Dulewicz and Higgs (2003) focused their
research on EI and the leadership capabilities of boards of directors. Higgs and Rowland
(2003) examined the impact of EI on leadership in the context of change using the
Dulewicz and Higgs (1999) questionnaire. Bar-On et al. (2006) researched leadership
potential in military recruits, and found that EI makes a significant difference. The EI of
emergent leaders (those who are not necessarily in a formal leadership position but who
take a leadership role) is a concept developed and tested by Wolff et al. (2002),
Pescosolido (2005) and Druskat and Pescosolido (2006). They report that leaders’
abilities to identify and respond to the emotions of group members are related to team
trust, communication and effectiveness.
Given the issues surrounding the debate about EI as ability, personality or both,
organisational behaviour researchers have explored various aspects with the strongest
support found for the Mayer and Salovey (1997) ability model (e.g. Daus & Ashkanasy,
2005; Jordan & Troth, 2002; McEnrue & Groves, 2006; Wong & Law, 2002). It should
also be noted that various researchers have developed their own instruments.
Commenting that the Mayer and Salovey model of EI and the MSCEIT that measure it
are not specifically geared to the workplace, and that the MSCEIT is also very lengthy,
Wong and Law (2002) developed their own measure - the 16-item Wong and Law
Emotional Intelligence Scale (see also Law, Wong & Song, 2004). Other work-related
measures include the Swinburne University Emotional Intelligence Test (Gardner &
Stough, 2002), the Workgroup Emotional Intelligence Profile (Jordan et al., 2002b),
which is focused on EI in work groups, and the Dulewicz and Higgs Emotional
Intelligence Questionnaire (Dulewicz & Higgs,1999).
Since EI is seen by all researchers, either partly or exclusively, as ability,
empirical work has been almost entirely quantitative and based on tests. There are very
few qualitative studies and one, by Wolff et al. (2002), was substantially quantitative in
nature. They used 10 trained doctoral students to carry out critical incident interviews
with 382 MBA students on EI and emerging leaders in groups and found empathy to be
the critical factor in perceived leader EI. Secondly, N. Clarke (2006) used two focus
50
groups of 22 healthcare professionals from various hospices to explore the relationship
between EI and workplace learning. His respondents reported the benefits of reflection
on emotional experience in the context of peer, supervisory and organisational support.
The themes of reflection and support also permeate the third study, in which Akerjordet
and Severinsson (2004) interviewed seven senior mental health nurses in one hospital.
Qualitative studies of EI and organisational change do not appear to have been done.
EI and organisational change
Given that change is a potentially emotional experience, the ability of people to
understand and deal with their own emotional responses and those of others, should be
valuable to both individuals and organisations. However, to date there has been little
conceptualisation of the relationship between EI and organisational change, and
minimal empirical investigation. While the literature on EI and transformational
leadership usually deals with change by implication, few researchers have explicitly
identified the role of EI in change.
Huy (1999) developed a model in which change receptivity, mobilisation and
learning are processes that incorporate cognition, emotion and action. EI helps an
individual deal usefully with each process. Paterson and Härtel (2002) propose that EI
helps people cope with the anxiety that characterises downsizing and employ productive
coping mechanisms.
Two conceptual articles have explored the relationships between EI,
organisational change and Senge’s (1990) concept of organisational learning. Jordan
(2005) hypothesises that emotionally intelligent individuals are able to develop the
disciplines of personal mastery, mental models, systems thinking, team learning and
shared vision, as they are required in the context of organisational change. The model of
Scott-Ladd and Chan (2004) goes one stage further in arguing that participative
decision-making allows emotionally intelligent people to develop personal mastery and
contribute to changing mental models and team learning.
Huy (1999) also points to the value of emotionally intelligent employees
contributing to the emotional capability of the wider organisation to deal with the
emotional consequences of radical change. The sensitivity to the emotional responses to
an office relocation referred to by Brown (2006) reveals an organisation with some
emotional capability. The concepts of emotionally intelligent leaders and organisations
in the context of change will be given greater attention in the development of Research
51
Questions 10 and 12.
In one of the few examples of empirical work in the intersection of EI and
organisational change, Ferres and Connell (2004) used an instrument based on
Goleman’s (1995) model and found that employees who perceived change leaders and
managers as being high in EI reported less change cynicism. In another study Higgs and
Rowland (2000) tested the relationship between EI and change leadership competence
using the managerial version of the Dulewicz and Higgs (1999) instrument, the
Emotional Intelligence Questionnaire, and their Change Leadership Competency
Questionnaire, and generally found significant correlations in self-reports. Vakola et al.
(2004) used a Greek version of the Mayer and Salovey (1997) model and found that EI
contributed significantly to attitudes to change.
Given the paucity of empirical research one can just speculate on the impact of
EI on the various categories of stakeholders affected by change. In the section on
organisational change in this literature review, a rationale will be presented for dividing
these stakeholders into four categories: change leaders, change managers, change agents
and change recipients. While external stakeholders such as customers, suppliers,
government and non-executive directors may also experience emotions from one
organisation’s change actions, the focus of this study is on organisational employees
(including managers).
Since the EI model of Mayer and Salovey (1997) enjoys the widest support, it
will be used here to indicate how various EI abilities help an organisation’s staff deal
with change. Since the four branches of the model, each with four types of ability, could
be applied to four categories of people affected by change, a full treatment of the 64
possible relationships lies outside the scope of this study. In a paper presented at the
Academy of Management (Smollan, 2006a) I explore the relationship in some depth,
but not to the extent of dissecting all the relationships. In this section a brief outline is
offered of how the model could be applied.
The first level, ‘perception of appraisal and expression of emotion’, includes a
person’s ability to identify his/her own feelings, and those of others, to express
emotions, and assess whether these emotions are accurate and honest. Given the
widespread expectation that emotions in organisations, let alone their display or
expression, are not acceptable, (e.g. Ashforth & Humphrey 1995; Muchinsky, 2000) the
ability to identify and express emotions in the context of change is clearly a sign of EI
and the starting point for understanding how emotions are generated by change. Change
52
leaders, managers and agents who are able to recognise the impact of change on
emotions will be able to anticipate the affective consequences of change and frame their
initiatives and responses accordingly. Empathy, which Lazarus (1999) says
accompanies the emotion of compassion and provides insight into others’ perspectives,
has been found to be a key variable in perceived leadership ability (Kellett, Humphrey
& Sleeth, 2002) and will enable people to understand other people’s cognitive, affective
and behavioural responses to change. Carl Rogers (1975, p. 3) defined empathy as
“perceiving the internal frame of reference of another with accuracy and with the
emotional components and meanings which pertain thereto” and suggested that empathy
can be a powerful catalyst in change.
Furthermore, people facilitating change need skill in responding appropriately to
employees’ emotions. Consultants can become the ‘lightning rods’ for employee
emotion as Jarrett (2004) has indicated. Leaders, according to Schein (2004, p. 416): must have the emotional strength to absorb much of the anxiety that change brings with it
as well as the ability to remain supportive to the organization through the transition phase,
even if group members become angry and obstructive. The leader is likely to be the target
of anger and criticism, because, by definition, he or she must challenge some of what the
group has taken for granted.
The injection of emotional appeals by change leaders is helpful in selling a new
vision (Kotter & Cohen, 2002; Fox & Amichai-Hamburger, 2001), and is often a tactic
used consciously or unconsciously by charismatic leaders (Wasielewski, 1985).
However, it needs to be done with perceived integrity, if the change is not to be resisted
(Ferres & Connell, 2004; Parry & Proctor-Thomson, 2002; Fox & Amichai-Hamburger,
2001). Change managers who do not necessarily support all changes are still expected
to sell the changes effectively to staff lower in the hierarchy.
The second branch of the Mayer and Salovey (1997) model, ‘emotional
facilitation of thinking’, enables people to prioritise thinking, improve memory and
judgement, consider multiple perspectives, solve problems and think creatively. Seo and
Feldman Barrett (2007, p. 933) report evidence to confound the traditional view that
“hot headed” people, “those who experience their feelings with greater intensity in
decision-making”, make poor decisions. The critical factor is that if people experiencing
emotions are aware of them and can regulate them (the fourth branch of Mayer and
Saloveys’ model), they can use their emotions to enhance thinking. George and Jones
(2001, p. 422) believe that “Emotions play a central role in initiating the change process
and directing organizational members’ sense-making activities to pressing concerns,
53
opportunities and problems.” Similarly, one of the respondents in Akerjordet and
Severinsson’s (2004, p. 166) qualitative research of EI among mental health nurses
revealed, “When I get a feeling during an encounter with a patient I have learned to take
it seriously”, and another said, “I think that feelings can contribute towards good
decision-making as they give me a signal about what is right and wrong”. Similar
responses could be expected in the context of an organisational change. The interplay
between cognition and emotion referred to earlier in the literature review (e.g. Lazarus,
1991, 1993) has been considered to facilitate creativity (Goleman, 1998b; George,
2000; George & Zhou, 2007; Montgomery, Hodges & Kaufman, 2004). Positive
emotions such as hope and excitement can generate creative processes (Isen, 2000).
Vakola et al. (2004) reported that the use of emotions to solve problems in
organisational change processes was statistically significant. Negative emotions such
anxiety or anger, could signal a need to make changes, or caution a person not to be too
carried away in a burst of excitement about a new development (Parrott, 2004).
The third level, ‘understanding and analysing emotions, employing emotional
knowledge’, contains the abilities to label and interpret emotions, understand their
causes and consequences, understand emotion blends and complex feelings, and note
how and why they can change in the course of time. Change is often perceived as a loss
(Huy, 2002; Wolfram Cox, 1997; Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006; Fineman, 2003), for
example, loss of power, status, authority, rewards, employment and personal
relationships. Those who are able to discern this are better able to address their own
emotions, and those of others. Bridges (2003) uses the term, ‘letting go’, to convey the
transition people need to make from one state to another. The uncertainty of change can
create combinations of positive and negative emotions, such as the excitement of
opening a new branch or a promotion, and the accompanying anxiety over the ability to
cope with the new demands. Emotions and moods unfold over time during change
(Isabella, 1990; Kiefer, 2002b; Elrod & Tippett, 2000). For example, hope can
degenerate into helplessness and anxiety can morph into relief. Emotions can subside
into moods and EI helps those who understand these dynamics to move to the next
branch of the model.
At the fourth and highest branch, ‘reflective regulation of emotions to promote
emotional and intellectual growth’, EI is the ability of people to monitor their emotions
and their influences, and to regulate their own emotions. Emotions can (but not
necessarily will) distract people from making rational choices (Seo & Feldman Barrett,
54
2006; Elfenbein, 2007) or responding appropriately to difficult situations. Those with
the ability to control their emotions in a suitable fashion are able to deal with the
conflict that may arise during change. Jordan and Troth’s (2002) experimental study
showed that people with EI were able to develop effective collaborative conflict
resolution skills. Change managers, agents and recipients often have to implement
changes with which they disagree and need to regulate their emotions, and, more
importantly, their emotional displays. This can create emotional dissonance, stress and
burnout, particularly if people are required to act in ways which they believe are
inauthentic (Zerbe, 2000; Morris & Feldman, 1996; Brotheridge & Grandey, 2002;
Turnbull, 1999). EI at this level allows people involved in change in any category to
reflect on an emotion and engage with it or detach from it, so that they can cope with
the consequences. In this regard, Lazarus’ (1991) approach to cognitive appraisal
provides a basis for understanding how people react to change. Primary appraisal is the
process of analysing the significance of an affective event (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996),
such as a change, while secondary appraisal is the identification of coping strategies
(Folkman & Lazarus 1988; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000, 2004). Paterson and Cary
(2002) incorporated appraisal theory into their model of affective responses to
downsizing and Fugate et al. (2008) did likewise in their study of restructuring.
EI at the highest level also involves the ability to ‘manage’ or address the
emotional responses of others. Huy’s (2002) research into a large-scale change revealed
that some initiatives require those managing change to develop a balance between
raising and lowering the emotional levels of themselves and others, which involve EI
abilities at the first level (identification and expression of emotion) and fourth level
(management of emotion). Huy suggests that to create the momentum for change high
activation pleasant emotions (Russell, 2003; Larsen et al., 2002), such as excitement,
are necessary, but to maintain ‘normal service’ for ongoing operations, low activation
emotions, such as calmness, are helpful. It is also important for managers to lower both
the high and low activation unpleasant emotions (such as anger and anxiety) that could
derail the change. It has been pointed out by others (e.g. Kotter, 1996) that
complacency, a low activation pleasant emotion, may have to be replaced with a
suitable level of anxiety or urgency, which are moderate to high activation unpleasant
emotions, to spur necessary change. This clearly involves a sophisticated degree of EI
ability.
To summarise this part of the literature review, all categories of people involved
55
in organisational change could use the EI abilities represented in Mayer and Salovey’s
(1997) model to identify, understand, express and manage the emotions of self and
others. Given that the empirical work on EI and change is extremely thin and no
qualitative studies appear to have been done, this study will add to the scant qualitative
literature on EI in organisational settings and pioneer its application to organisational
change.
Research needs to explore how the 16 abilities of EI in the model contribute to
the effective leadership, management and experience of change. While the above model
currently enjoys the most backing among academics other models might also be
usefully applied. In particular the concept of trait EI (e.g. Petrides & Furnham, 2000;
Perez et al., 2005; Tett et al., 2005) could examine concepts such as empathy,
adaptability, resilience and assertiveness, in the context of their utility in organisational
change. Measures of dispositional coping with change (e.g. Judge, Thoresen, Pucik &
Welbourne, 1999; Wanberg & Banas, 2000; Oreg, 2003, 2006) could be correlated with
measures of trait EI.
In my model two of the research questions explore the impact of an individual’s
EI in the context of organisational change, and that person’s perception of the EI
abilities of change leaders, managers and agents. It does not explore the impact of the EI
of group members on the cognitive, affective and behavioural reactions of a person to
change. However, as the work of Druskat, Pescosolido and colleagues indicates
(Druskat & Wolff, 2001; Wolff et al., 2002; Pescosolido, 2005; Druskat & Pescosolido,
2006; Druskat et al., 2006) people’s ability to adapt to change is affected by the EI of
their peers. Nevertheless, while empathy and support from any source are helpful in
dealing with change, this thesis will explicitly address only the contributions of the EI
of change leaders, managers and agents to an employee’s responses to change.
So far, I have reviewed literature on emotions in general, emotions in
organisations, emotional intelligence in general and emotional intelligence in
organisations. In each section the relationship to change has been outlined. Emotions
are an integral part of human nature, manifest themselves in organisational settings,
because of and despite organisational expectations and other forces. Change evokes
emotions which are used to drive, implement and sustain it - or resist it. The literature
review now moves on to a deeper analysis of the nature of organisational change.
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2.3 Organisational Change
I begin by examining various typologies or frameworks of change, then identify
possible targets of change and change players (leaders, managers, agents and
recipients), and finally, review steps and phases in the process of organisational change.
The role emotion plays in individual responses, together with its cognitive antecedents
and behavioural consequences, will be highlighted.
Typologies of Organisational Change
Change can occur in many facets of an organisation’s existence. Many typologies of
macro-organisational change have been presented in the literature, mostly in
management and organisational psychology, and some from other research disciplines.
Within the management discipline change has generally been reviewed from a strategic
perspective as the attempts of an organisation to adjust to a range of environmental
factors. The approach of organisational behaviour, and specifically Organisation (or
Organisational) Development (OD), seeks to understand how organisations plan and
implement change, how individuals react to change and the processes by which it is
designed and introduced. OD is an approach to planned change that evolved in the
1950s as a humanistic framework for improving organisational processes, and uses a
number of techniques, such as training groups, sensitivity training, survey design and
feedback (French & Bell, 2005). Organisational transformation is a variation of OD and
involves a fundamental change in the way an organisation operates (French, Bell &
Zawacki, 2005, Porras & Silvers, 1991).
A number of frameworks have been developed that analyse change in terms of
nature, scope and scale, frequency, and determining factors, producing a plethora of
labels (see Table 3, Typologies of Change). Watzlawick, Weakland and Fisch (1974)
distinguish between first-order change as a change within a system, and second-order
change, which is a change of the system itself. Golembiewski, Billingsley and Yeager
(1976) identify three levels of change. Alpha change involves a variation of a state that
is basically constant (which they liken to the first-order change of Watzlawick et al.,
1974); beta change occurs in the use of different form of measurement or frequency of
the intervals; while gamma change (similar to second-order change) involves a
“redefinition or reconceptualisation of some domain, a major change in the perspective
or frame of reference” (p. 135). Porras and Silvers (1991) divide gamma change into
57
two concepts. Gamma (A) change occurs in an existing organisational paradigm without
the addition of a new variable, such as when organisation that moves within a
production-driven paradigm from a focus on cost to a focus on quality. Gamma (B)
change means the replacement of the paradigm itself with another that has at least one
new variable, for example, the replacement of a production-driven paradigm with a
customer-focus paradigm.
Theorists Types of change Nature of change Targets of change Watzlawick, Weakland & Fisch (1974)
First-order change
Second-order change
Change within the system
Change of the system
Golembiewski, Billingsley & Yeager (1976)
Alpha change
Existential state of a relatively stable conceptual domain
Beta change
Existential state and intervals of measurement.
Gamma change
Reconceptualisation of domain
Tushman & Romanelli (1985)
Convergent change Reorientations Recreations
Incremental change and adaptation Simultaneous and discontinuous shifts Simultaneous and discontinuous shifts
Strategy (products, markets, technology), power, structure, controls Strategy , power, structure, controls Values + strategy, power, structure, controls
Bartunek & Moch (1987)
First-order change
Second-order change
Third-order change
Factors in existing schemata
Schemata
Employee choice of schemata
Dunphy & Stace (1988, 1990)
Finetuning
Incremental adjustment
Modular transformation
Corporate transformation
Changing the fit of variables Adjustments to changing environment Radical change in division Radical change in organisation
Strategy, structure, people, processes Strategy, structure, management processes Many of the above within a division
Many of the above within an organisation
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Nadler & Tushman (1989)
Tuning Adaptation Reorientation Recreation
Incremental change in anticipation of future events Incremental change in reaction to external events Strategic change in anticipation of future events Strategic change in reaction to external events
Gersick (1991) Incremental change
Revolutionary change
“Rules of the game”
Deep structure/“the game”
Huy & Mintzberg (2003) Dramatic change
Systematic change
Organic change
Quick, triggered by crisis or opportunity, led from top
Slower, more orderly, led from middle and by consultants Messy, arises from lower levels
Any of costs, structure, strategy, culture Processes Products, services, processes
Porras & Silvers (1991) Alpha change Beta change Gamma (A) change Gamma (B) change
Change in perceived variables within a paradigm Change in perceived values about variables within a paradigm Change within a paradigm by adding variables Change in the paradigm
Organising arrangements
Social factors
Policy
Technology
Porras & Robertson (1992)
First-order change
Second-order change
Developmental (planned)
Evolutionary (unplanned)
Transformational (planned) Revolutionary (unplanned)
Organising arrangements
Social factors
Policy
Technology
Weick & Quinn (1999) Episodic change
Continuous change
Table 3: Typologies of change
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Bartunek and Moch (1987) conceptualise first-order change as modifications
within schemata, second-order change as changes of schemata and third-order change as
one where individuals determine their own schemata. Porras and Robertson (1992)
comment only on first-order change, as being linear and continuous, and second-order
change, which is discontinuous, radical and multi-dimensional. First-order change can
be developmental (planned) or evolutionary (unplanned), whereas second-order can be
transformational (planned) or revolutionary (unplanned).
Tushman and Romanelli’s (1985) model of punctuated equilibrium separates
periods of convergent change (concerned with incremental changes to strategy, power,
structure and controls), from divergent or more radical change, which is sub-divided
into reorientations (simultaneous shifts in the four targets of change) and recreations
(which add the complexity of change in core values to the aforementioned categories).
Nadler and Tushman (1989) have elaborated on this model by distinguishing between
two types of incremental change, tuning, which seeks to improve efficiency in
anticipation of future events, and adaptation, which is a response to external events.
Similarly, in terms of strategic change, reorientations are anticipatory while recreations
are reactive.
Dunphy and Stace (1988, 1990) examine the increasing scale of change in terms
of fine-tuning, incremental adjustment, modular transformation and corporate
transformation. They describe four forms of transformation: developmental transitions,
task-focused transitions, charismatic transformation and turnarounds, each of which
should be managed differently. According to Greenwood and Hinings (1995, p. 1025),
“Convergent change occurs within the parameters of an existing archetypal template”,
while radical change, which is characterised by the pace and magnitude of upheaval,
“occurs when an organization moves from one template-in-use to another”. Gersick
(1991) analysed the punctuated equilibrium model across multiple research disciplines
and differentiated between incremental change, which leaves the ‘deep structures’ or the
‘rules of the game’ intact, while revolutionary change dismantles these structures and
changes the game. Using a similar line of questioning Van den Ven and Poole (1995)
developed a model that seeks to explain how change occurs across a number of fields in
the physical and social sciences. Reviewing different frameworks of change Weick and
Quinn (1999) distinguish between episodic change, which is infrequent, slower, and
more strategic, and continuous change, which in incremental and adaptive.
Another lens researchers have used to explain organisational change is the
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degree to which change is a planned and deliberate process or one that emerges. This
approach incorporates an analysis of the factors that drive different types of change and
the types of change players who are involved in the process. Using this approach,
Kerber and Buono (2005) identify three approaches to change. Directed change is a top-
down approach, planned change involves more consultation and guided change, which
taps employee commitment, expertise and creativity, allows change to emerge more
organically. Huy and Mintzberg (2003) focus on three types of change. Dramatic
change is initiated by top management in times of crisis or opportunity, systematic
change is a more planned and orderly change and often promoted by staff and
consultants, and organic change arises from lower level staff, often without formal
management processes. Dunphy and Stace (1988, 1990) propose that different styles of
change leadership (collaborative, consultative, directive and coercive) should be
employed, depending on which scale of change is being enacted. Their matrix indicates
collaborative and consultative approaches are suitable to fine-tuning and incremental
adjustment, labelling the change strategy participative evolution, while collaborative
and consultative approaches in the context of modular or corporate transformations are
charismatic transformations. Coercive and directive leadership, when applied to fine-
tuning and incremental change, is termed forced evolution, whereas when the focus is
on modular and corporate transformations, the change strategy is dictatorial
transformation.
Most of the theorists listed in Table 3 have identified different specific facets
that an organisation can target for change. For example, Dunphy and Stace (1990) refer
to strategy, structure, people and processes. Huber, Sutcliffe, Miller and Glick (1995)
have three broad categories and 10 types of change targets overall. Externally focused
changes refer to strategy and external stakeholder relationships; internally focused
changes deal with goals and culture, operational, administrative, communication and
staffing issues; while changes in organisational form deal with the responsibility and
resources of senior managers and people at lower levels and the addition or subtraction
of a major organisational unit.
The most comprehensive approach has been developed by Porras and Silvers
(1991) and Porras and Roberston (1992). They developed a table that identified four
main categories of targets of organisational change with inter-connecting relationships:
organising arrangements (including plans and rewards), social factors (covering culture,
group processes and management style), technology (including machinery and
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processes) and physical setting (which embraces design, size, space, light, etc.). In total
23 sub-categories were listed (see Table 4).
Organising Arrangements
Social Factors Physical Setting Technology
1. Goals 2. Strategies 3. Structure 4. Administrative policies and procedures 5. Administrative systems 6. Reward systems 7. Ownership
1. Culture 2. Management style 3. Interaction processes 4. Informal patterns and networks 5. Individual attributes
1. Space configuration 2. Physical ambiance 3. Interior design 4. Architectural design
1. Tools, equipment and machinery 2. IT 3. Job design 4. Work flow design 5. Technical expertise 6. Technical procedures 7. Technical Systems
Table 4: Targets of change
Source: Porras & Robertson, 1992 (Factors Constituting the Work Setting)
The various frameworks and models have several common aspects: change can
be more or less radical, complex or simple, quick or slow. Changes of greater scope,
complexity and speed have more impact on systems, organisations and the people that
live and work within them. For the purposes of this study these typologies of macro-
organisational change need to be viewed through the lens of micro-level change. What
might appear to be a minor change on an organisational level may be perceived by an
individual to have very radical personal implications. Some of the same terms have
been used in both literatures. For example, while Bartunek and Moch (1987, p. 485)
refer to organisational schemata, “which generate shared meanings or frames of
reference, for the organization as a whole or for various sub-groups within it”, Lau and
Woodman (1995) use the term as a cognitive mechanism for developing individual
attitudes towards change. Similarly, George and Jones (2001) present a model of change
at the level of the individual where the concept of schemata is used to explore resistance
to change. The focus of the current study is on change experienced through the eyes
(and heart) of the individual.
Little attention has been paid to emotion in most of the conceptual frameworks
of macro-level change. Gersick (1991) briefly acknowledges the emotional impact of
change, Porras and Robertson (1992) commented on the emotional aspects of conflict
and Kerber and Buona (2005) only identify one form of change - directed change - as
having emotional repercussions. While many authors have noted the emotional impacts
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of change, Huy (2002) and Kiefer (2002b) suggests that radical change will provoke
particularly intense emotions. Therefore, one aim of this research study is to identify
what emotions are elicited by perceptions of the specific target(s) of change, and the
scale, speed, frequency and timing of changes. Another is to examine how emotions are
generated by people’s perceptions of the processes that are employed to create and
implement change. And given that people involved in change can be classified in
different ways, yet another aim is to uncover how the role people play in change elicits
emotional responses.
Change Players
In any organisational change there are likely to be several categories of people who play
a part. Some lead change, others are required to manage it or implement it in their
departments or divisions and motivate others to do so, some play roles in facilitating or
advising on change, and some will simply be affected by the change and do what is
necessary or resist the change or some aspects of it.
Various authors have sought to distinguish between leadership and management,
some specifically in the context of change. Reviewing various approaches to leadership
Yukl (1999) found a tendency to consider leadership as oriented towards change
whereas managers focus on stability and efficiency. For example, Kotter (1996) views
leaders as establishing direction and aligning people by motivating and inspiring, while
managers plan, budget, organise, staff, control and solve problems. Kouzes and Posner
(1995, p. 30) use terms that have an emotional theme to them in defining leadership as
“the art of mobilizing others to want to struggle for shared aspirations” and which
usually involves change, whereas management is about order, organisation and control.
According to them the role of a leader is to challenge the process, inspire a shared
vision, enable others to act, model the way, and “encourage the heart”. Bennis and
Nanus (1985, p. 92) suggest that “By focussing attention on a vision, the leader operates
on the emotional and spiritual resources of an organization” while the manager
“operates on the physical resources of the organization.” Bass’ (1985) theory of
transformational leadership and Conger and Kanungo’s (1998) theory of charismatic
leadership identify the leader’s ability to articulate a compelling vision of change and
generate the desire for change in others. Emotion is a significant element of both
theories.
Higgs and Rowland (2000) point out that models of organisational change
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seldom distinguish between different categories of people involved, yet their own
reveals some ambivalence. They developed a change management competency
framework with eight change competency clusters: initiation, impact, facilitation,
leadership, learning, execution, presence, and use of technology (use of change tools,
theories and models). Two of these competencies, however, change initiation and
change leadership, clearly refer to change leadership rather than to management. Tubbs
and Schulz (2005) developed a taxonomy of 50 leadership competencies under seven
headings, two of which are explicitly related to change. Innovation and creativity
contain five items and leading change seven, and in the latter category is managing the
change process.
Caldwell (2003) believes that the roles of change leader and manager are
complementary and often overlapping, even if there are conceptual differences. Using a
Delphi technique for identifying the attributes of change leaders and change managers
he found that the top three attributes of change leadership were inspiring vision,
entrepreneurship and integrity/honesty, whereas for change managers the top three were
empowering others, team building and learning from others. He suggests that change
leaders are at the most senior levels and focus on strategic change, whereas change
managers tend to operate in the middle and on tactical and operational issues. However,
does acknowledge that it is often difficult to separate the roles that people play in
change and that at different times people need to use a blend of competencies.
A number of overlapping perspectives can be used to classify those who are
affected by change. The first refers to hierarchy, the second to scope, the third to
importance. If a change is initiated from those at the top, it usually involves a large
section of the organisation, and deals with strategy, structure and/or culture (Huy &
Mintzberg, 2003). Change roles could be simply seen in terms of hierarchical levels:
change leaders are the CEO/general manager and senior managers, change managers are
middle managers and first-level managers, and change recipients are non-managerial
employees. Non-executive directors (Dulewicz & Higgs, 2003) and change agents
(Furnham, 2000) could also be involved in the process. The typologies of change
referred to earlier (e.g. Nadler & Tushman, 1989; Huber et al., 1995) indicate that
strategic, radical and divergent change will in most cases be led by senior management.
Huy and Mintzberg (2003) suggest that the type of change being contemplated dictates
who leads it: dramatic change is led by senior management, systematic change is led by
staff groups and consultants and organic change arises from the ranks of staff. While
64
Woodward and Hendry (2004) distinguish between change leaders, who initiate change,
change managers who execute it, and those (including managers) who simply
experience it. They conducted one survey of the change leaders, but surprisingly
surveyed the other two in one category.
However, these generic approaches cannot be appropriately applied to every
change event or related series of changes. Hierarchy alone does not always determine
the roles people play, and neither do the scope or importance of the change. To use a
theoretical example, in one firm developing a technologically innovative product line
the change leader might be the research and development manager, who aims to
persuade the CEO and others in the senior management team to agree to the change.
The marketing manager may give unqualified and enthusiastic support and devote
considerable energy to adding ideas to the proposed changes. Meanwhile the head of
finance is extremely concerned about the financial implications of funding the change
and initially actively resists it. The head of human resources is worried about how the
firm will staff the expansion required in the change and procrastinates in contributing to
the change plans. The CEO is ambivalent but finally backs the change. It is clear that
not all of the senior management team can be called change leaders and might not
support the changes. How passionately will each senior manager articulate the
‘compelling vision’? They might simply take on the role of change managers and
implement the changes finally approved. Some middle and first-level managers may
have no active role to play in managing some aspects of the change. Therefore, one
cannot classify people simply according to their seniority, but rather according to the
role they are given, or assume, in a specific change process. A wide-ranging change,
such as the adoption of a new form for leave, may be initiated by one middle manager.
Changes that are of strategic importance or which are radical, however, are usually led
from the top (Huy, 1999).
Non-management staff can also take on the roles of change leaders. Morrison
and Phelps (1999) explored the concept of extra-role behaviours and sought to
understand what motivates employees to take charge and initiate constructive work
changes that are beyond the expectations the organisations have of them. Those who
took such action were a mixture of staff at all hierarchical levels and were found to do
so when they believed management was open to employee-initiated change. Moon,
Kamdar, Mayer and Takeuchi (2008) also found non-managers ‘taking charge’. The
roles of emergent or informal leaders have been discussed by Pescosolido (2005) and
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Druskat and Pescosolido (2006).
The term change agent has been used widely and with many differing definitions
and classifications. Buchanan and Badham (1999, p. 610) define the change agent “as
any individual seeking to reconfigure an organization’s roles, responsibilities,
structures, outputs, processes, systems, technology or other resources.” Dover (2003, p.
245) conceives of the change agent more narrowly as “a person who translates the
strategic change vision into pragmatic change behaviour.” Furnham (2001) notes that
one of the roles of a manager at times is to be a change agent. London (1988) divides
change agents into three broad categories: change generators, change implementers and
change adopters, identifying a total of 10 separate types. Most of these agents are
managers in the organisation but some are outsiders, such as consultants. Kanter, Stein
and Jick (1992) proposed three categories: change strategists, change implementers and
change recipients. Caldwell (2003) has a fourfold typology of change agents
(specifically for human resources managers): champions, adapters, consultants and
synergists, each of whom have specific roles to play. Spencer and Pruss (1993, p. xvii),
under the umbrella of “operators of change”, distinguish between change consultants
who are external advisers, change managers, who implement change at departmental
level, and change agents, who make the changes happen “at the coalface”. Many job
advertisements often use the sub-title of change agent appended to the formal job title,
or use the term somewhere in the job description, and usually refer to those leading
change. The change agent in episodic change is considered by Weick and Quinn (1999)
as the “prime mover who creates the change” (p. 373), while the role of the change
agent in continuous change is to make sense of the change dynamics, “recognize
adaptive emergent changes, make them more salient, and reframe them” (p. 381). Jarrett
(2004) points to the importance of change agents understanding the emotions
experienced by all change players. He cautions that the change agent may become a
“lightning rod for wanted feelings” (p. 250), and will also need to reflect on his/her own
emotions during the change consultancy.
Some people may play a number of these roles in different facets of an
organisational change. Departmental managers are both subject to change initiated from
above and required to implement changes at their level whether they agree with them or
not. It should also be noted that one change may incorporate several other changes (such
as the introduction of a new product line, building a new factory, staffing the new
division, designing the new jobs, etc.) and the roles played by various organisational
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members or change players will depend on each element of the change (Huy, 2002).
It should also be noted that other change players are external stakeholders who
are affected by the change, such as customers, suppliers, government staff, joint venture
partners and members of the community. They may also have positive or negative
feelings about changes initiated by an organisation, and those in the organisation, or
consulting to it, need to be aware of these feelings and respond appropriately. However,
this study is focused on the organisation’s employees and will not deal directly with
other stakeholders.
For the purposes of this study, those involved in organisational change will be
classified into four groups. This categorisation has been chosen since different
‘investments’ in the change process are required of different players. These
contributions include the emotions they are likely to experience, and may be expected to
express or suppress, and generate in others. Change leaders are those who conceive of
and initiate change, change managers implement change, change agents are external to
the organisation or the division undergoing change and are called on to facilitate some
aspect of the change, and change recipients are subjected to the change and have no
other role. And to repeat an earlier point, people can play more than one role in a series
of related changes. One aspect of the empirical work in my study will be to identify the
emotions experienced by different change players and the factors that contributed to
them. Another will be to explore the emotions that they were expected to express or
hide, and those that they were expected to generate in others - and how these related to
the change roles they were allocated or assumed.
Steps and Phases in the Process of Organisational Change
An organisational change goes through various steps and phases. Some aspects of the
change will progress in linear fashion while others will move in a cyclical way or move
forwards and backwards until the process is completed, partially completed or stalled.
Any plan requires the determination of purpose, research, design, implementation and
control, the last doubling back to other steps if the plan is not working or partially
working, or if the conditions have changed.
Planning and implementing change projects requires change players to adjust
their thinking, feeling and actions to accommodate the change (Piderit, 2000; Smollan,
2006a). Various researchers have identified a number of discrete actions. Lewin’s
(1947) seminal approach proposed three phases. Unfreezing is necessary to change
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attitudes and behaviours and is accomplished through rational explanations of what
change is needed, why it is needed, who will be affected and how, when and where it
will be done. Changing is the act of implementation and is backed by tangible and
psychological support. Refreezing occurs when the change is accomplished and is
embedded in organisational practices and individual behaviour through reward and
recognition. Kotter (1996) extended Lewin’s approach to eight steps: establishing a
sense of urgency, developing a vision and strategy, communicating the change vision,
empowering broad-based action, generating short-term wins, consolidating the gains
and producing more change, and anchoring the new approaches in the culture. Jick’s
‘Ten Commandments of Implementing Change’ are: analyse the organisation and its
need for change, create a shared vision and common direction, separate from the past,
create a sense of urgency, support a strong leader role, line up political sponsorship,
craft an implementation plan, develop enabling structures, communicate with and
involve people, and reinforce and institutionalise change (Jick & Peiperl, 2003, p. 177).
Dawson (2003, p. 40) queries the reality of the “recipe and linear planned
approach” to organisational change, and argues that change is a messy, complex and
frequently political process. Different contexts of change make it impossible to itemise
a neat set of steps that will fit all change programmes. The interplay of various players
can change both the substance and dynamics of the change. He developed a ‘processual’
model of change, based on Pettigrew’s (1985) concept that change does not follow in a
preordained series of steps and is complicated by a range of contextual variables,
particularly those relating to power and politics (Buchanan & Badham, 1999, 2008).
What many theorists have in common is the belief that for most change to be
successful there has to be buy-in from a range of change players (e.g. Kotter & Cohen,
2002; Szabla, 2007; Bean & Hamilton, 2006). Another common view is that the ways in
which people think, feel and behave in response to an organisational change may vary
as the different phases develop, as more information becomes available (Isbabella,
1990; Jimmieson, Terry & Callan., 2004; Paterson & Cary, 2002) and as personal,
group and organisational processes and outcomes are anticipated or realised. The
rollercoaster models (e.g. Elrod & Tippett, 2000; Schneider & Goldwasser, 1998; Goss
et al., 1993) indicate that people experience positive and negative emotions as they go
through the ups and downs of organisational change.
One line of investigation in the empirical work will be to determine what
emotions people experience at different stages of the change process, and what factors
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influence them. For example, Schein (2004) suggests that in the ‘unfreezing’ stage of a
change (Lewin, 1947), employees often reject information that disconfirms previously
accepted assumptions, partly because it triggers anxiety and guilt with regard to learning
new ways. In the ‘refreezing’ stage he believes that people who successfully adapt to
the change often do so because the anxiety of learning has been attended to by change
leaders.
So far the literature review has analysed the nature of emotions, their prevalence
in organisational life and their role in organisational change. It has indicated that
organisational change can vary in terms of complexity in terms of its scale and pace and
how these elements can impact on people at the individual level. I have explored the
targets of change, identified a range of change players and outlined the steps that could
be taken to implement successful change. I now review existing models of individual
responses to change and then detail the development of a new model.
2.4 Individual Responses to Change
This part of the literature review is structured as follows. I first explore the relationships
between the nature of the cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change and
discuss a number of models of emotions and change. Then I specifically identify
responses as positive, negative, neutral and ambivalent or mixed, and analyse what
these evaluations signify to different change players. Given its prevalence in the change
literature the nature of resistance to change is highlighted as mostly a negative response
but one that may also be seen as positive and constructive.
Cognitive appraisal theory (Lazarus, 1991), reviewed earlier, takes the position
that employees first appraise the significance of an event, such as an organisational
change for their wellbeing (Woodward & Hendry, 2004). Thus favourability of change
outcomes becomes critical (Paterson & Härtel, 2002; Matheny & Smollan, 2005).
Secondary appraisal triggers emotional responses when people consider causes of the
change and use a number of lenses in doing so. Attributions of justice, for example, can
provoke emotional reactions (Paterson & Härtel, 2002; Paterson & Cary, 2002), as do
perceptions of the scale, pace, and timing of the change (Huy, 1999), and the frequency
of change itself may become a major factor (Kiefer, 2005). Secondary appraisal also
involves a range of problem- and emotion-focused coping strategies (Folkman &
Lazarus, 1984, 1988; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000, 2004; Woodward & Hendry, 2004;
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Latack, 1986; Fugate et al., 2008).
To explore the cognitive process of evaluating change in more depth, it is
helpful to engage the literature on framing and sense-making, which are related
concepts. Weick and Quinn (1999) assign a prime role to change agents (in the broad
sense of the term) in framing change and helping others make sense of it. According to
Bean and Hamilton (2006, p. 323), “framing is a way to manage meaning by selecting
and highlighting certain facts or issues over others.” This form of ‘sensegiving’ is a way
of managing meaning in which one construction can be privileged over others. Framing
‘reality’ for others to buy into can be a self-serving process. For example, to engage
employees, change leaders, managers and agents often frame change in positive ways.
People frame change in different ways and may not understand or accept frames
different to their own. They make sense of their environments by comparing new
information with the old and trying to incorporate it in a cohesive understanding of the
way they perceive reality (Lüscher & Lewis, 2008).
Just as macro-level models of change use the concept of schemas/schemata (e.g.
Bartunek & Moch, 1987), so too do some at the micro-level. Focussing on cognitive
processes, Lau and Woodman (1995) use the concept of individual change schemata
that are shaped by multiple influences. They indicate that a person has a schema of
organisational change that is developed from a range of factors, such as personality,
organisational culture and previous experience of change. George and Jones’ (2001)
process model of individual responses to change embraces the concept that cognition
and affect are interdependent. They propose that people faced with organisational
change find that future schemas may challenge their present schemas of organisational
life, and that the discrepancy causes unease and triggers resistance.
Using a social constructionist approach, Mills (2000) suggests that discourses
around change are part of the sense-making process. She found that while some
employees have individual preferences for methods of sense-making most are
influenced by the prevailing ‘geosocial’ discourse. In other words, people in one
geographically-based department tend to favour one form of discourse, such as, the
‘alienated’, ‘aligned’, ‘oppositional’, ‘detached’ and ‘operational’, that influences the
sense-making of the members of that department.
Downing (1997) suggests that change efforts often fail when those initiating and
implementing them focus on cognitive frameworks without dealing with the emotional
ramifications for others. They may, however, use emotional ploys in framing change as
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an exciting or romantic opportunity, and may not notice that others frame it as an
anxiety-causing problem. Research conducted by Bartunek et al. (2006) reveals that
recipients of change use cognitive and affective cues to make sense of a change, and
both impact on their performance and wellbeing. Szabla (2007) found that people
respond better to change, on cognitive, affective and intentional levels, when leaders,
employ rational-empirical or participative styles rather than power-coercive strategies.
Conversations around change can intensify the emotional climate (Ford, Ford &
McNamara, 2002; Piderit, 2000). Mills (2000) found that when change was perceived
negatively it resulted in emotional engagement that helped employee make sense of the
change, usually through an alienated or oppositional discourse. Conversations can lead
to emotional contagion (Barsade, 2002; Bartunek et al., 2006; Jansen, 2004; Totterdell,
et al., 2004) and common behavioural responses, both positive and negative.
Another construct of cognitive responses to change is that of readiness, which
Armenakis, Harris and Mossholder (1993) liken to Lewin’s (1947) definition of
unfreezing. They suggest that various change players may consider that it is the
organisations (or certain sections of them) that are unready for change and not only
some individuals. Communicating the need for change and enhancing self- and group-
efficacy are crucial components. To enhance readiness they believe that change leaders
need to first engage with opinion leaders in the organisation who can help shape
change-related conversations. More recently Holt et al. (2007) developed and tested a
model and questionnaire of readiness for change. It comprises four types of factors:
content, process, context and individual attributes. Use of the questionnaire can help an
organisation identify which factors are undermining readiness in various sections of the
organisation. Emotion plays a negligible role in the model.
A number of models of emotional reactions to change have been published and
were briefly mentioned in the introduction to this thesis. They are explored in more
depth here.
Following a study into employees’ cognitive and affective responses to events at
work, Gibson (1995) concluded that these responses tended to follow ‘scripts’ in which
common patterns and sequences were found. The model he developed indicates that
appraisal of an organisational situation triggers a cognitive search and a parallel
affective response. Emotions are aroused through the cognitive appraisal of an event
and displayed or hidden depending on cultural and organisational norms and the
individual’s perception of likely outcomes of the overt emotional expression. Individual
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actions may be followed by organisational action and change. While Gibson states that
change is inherently emotional, and the book chapter is entitled ‘Emotional scripts and
change in organizations’, his respondents were asked to comment on emotion inducing
events, but not specifically in the context of change, to which only some seem to have
referred.
The influential Affective Events Theory of Weiss and Cropanzano (1996) was
outlined in the section of the literature review on emotions and needs further elucidation
here. This theory proposes that work events trigger affective reactions, both moods and
discrete emotions, which are influenced by disposition. For example people with high
negative affectivity (Watson & Tellegen, 1985) tend to experience negative emotional
reactions to events. The affective reactions impact on work attitudes (which also have
antecedents in job satisfaction-related features of the work environment), and these
attitudes influence judgement-driven behaviours and affect-driven behaviours.
Judgement-driven behaviours are outcomes of both satisfaction with pre-existing
features of the work environment and specific emotion-producing events. Negative
behaviours include withdrawal in various forms, such as resignation, retirement,
absenteeism and lateness, while positive behaviours could include helping behaviour.
Affect-driven behaviours are conceptualised as those which derive directly from
emotional reactions to the event. Moods and emotions are treated as conceptually
distinct in the model but the authors suggest that the distinction can be blurred. Both can
impact on behaviour with positive and negative consequences for performance. For
example, while feelings of happiness and hope with regard to an impending change can
benefit performance, they can also be a distraction from current performance demands.
Negative emotions like anger and fear can also distract people from acceptable levels of
performance but may redirect attention to behaviours that stimulate performance.
Piderit (1999, 2000) developed one of the first models that looked at cognitive,
affective and intentional drivers of resistance to organisational change. The model
identifies support, resistance and ambivalence as the outcome of the relationship
between the drivers. She also warns that treating resistance as purely negative is a
mistake - many good intentions of the employees will be overlooked or deliberately
ignored if the management rhetoric frames resistance as only destructive.
Szabla’s (2007) model also focuses on resistance to change as the outcome of
cognitive, affective and intentional elements and specifically identifies leadership
actions as the key to these responses. Those leaders who encounter resistance to change
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are those who try to use coercion rather than rational persuasion or participation.
Two models have been developed by Paterson and colleagues for a specific type
of change - downsizing. Paterson and Härtel (2002) use cognitive appraisal theory
(Lazarus, 1991; Scherer, 1999) to explain how individuals first consider the potential
impact the pending change will have on their wellbeing (primary appraisal), and then
consider causes and consequences of the change, and how they will cope (secondary
appraisal). The latter is strongly influenced by perceptions of organisational justice.
These coping strategies comprise problem-focused strategies, such as looking for a new
job or making submissions to management to minimise redundancies, and emotion-
focused coping, such as dealing with the negative emotions that arise (Folkman &
Lazarus, 1984; 1988). Primary appraisal is affected by organisational factors, such as
communication about the nature of the change, and individual factors, such as outcome
favourability, while secondary appraisal influences justice judgements through
perceptions of the nature of organisational communication and decision processes.
Individual characteristics that affect employee responses are disposition and emotional
intelligence.
Another model of individual responses to downsizing has been presented and
tested by Paterson and Cary (2002). Using Weiss and Cropanzano’s (1996) Affective
Events Theory as their basis, they indicate that aspects of the change programme, such
as participation and communication, stimulate cognitive evaluations of the fairness of
the changes, and affective reactions, based on appraisal of the event and its significance
for the individual. Both cognitive and affective responses have outcomes that relate to
acceptance of change, trust in management and employee morale. An empirical test of
the model supported its overall concept.
Rather than focussing on one discrete change event, Kiefer (2005) developed
and tested a model that specifically focused on negative emotions (which she suggests
are more likely) during ongoing and multiple organisational changes. According to the
model, emotions are mediated by perceptions of the impact of changes on working
conditions, status and future prospects, and organisational treatment. The outcomes of
the negative emotions are withdrawal behaviours (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996), and
lower trust in the organisation (Paterson & Cary, 2002). She tested the model in the
study of a merger and found that ongoing change did elicit negative emotions when
employees perceived the results of these changes to be impacting unfavourably on their
jobs.
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Focussing on the stressful aspects of change, Brotheridge (2003) developed and
tested a model in which emotional exhaustion, other affective and physiological
consequences, and the behavioural outcome of effort and intentions to quit, are
mediated by perceptions of fairness.
The interplay between cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change
has been captured in a number of other models. Some of the models are presented in the
form of a matrix or continuum of behaviours that relate to acceptance of and resistance
to change. Some identify a mix of antecedent and outcome variables that mould
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses. Others examine how responses on some
or all levels alter with the passage of time.
Using a matrix approach, Bovey and Hede (2001a; 2001b) first point to
behaviour as an outcome of cognition and emotion, and then develop a model along
axes of active-passive and overt-covert forms of behaviour. Active-overt positive
responses see the individual initiating or embracing change; active-covert behaviours
are supporting or co-operating; passive-covert reactions are giving in and complying,
while passive-overt responses are agreeing and accepting. In terms of negative
responses, active-overt behaviours are opposing, arguing and obstructing; active-covert
actions are stalling, dismantling and undermining; passive-covert reactions include
ignoring, withdrawing and avoiding; and passive-overt behaviours are observing,
refraining and waiting.
Overlaying Bovey and Hede’s (2001a) model with Piderit’s (1999) model,
Matheny’s (2004) matrix sees active and passive behaviours along one axis with
positive, negative and ambivalent actions (sub-divided into conscious and unconscious
behaviours) along the other. This gives rise to two positive responses, supporting and
complying; two ambivalent responses - questioning and reflecting; and four negative
reactions - dissenting, defending, obstructing and disregarding. Figure 3 depicts the
models of Piderit, Bovey and Hede, and Matheny.
Mishra and Spreitzer (1998) have provided a useful matrix of the affective
responses of survivors to a specific form of change - downsizing - and the
accompanying behavioural responses. Constructive/passive emotions (calmness and
relief) lead to commitment, loyalty and the following of orders. Constructive/active
emotional responses are hope and excitement where survivors aim to use their initiative
and solve problems. Destructive/active responses include anger, disgust, and moral
outrage on the affective level, and disloyalty and retaliation on the behavioural level.
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Piderit, 1999
Bovey & Hede, 2001a, 2001b
Active More visible
Passive Less visible
Conscious Positive Supporting Complying
Ambivalent
Questioning Reflecting
Negative
Dissenting Obstructing
Unconscious Negative
Defending Disregarding
Matheny, 2004
Figure 3: Models of support for and resistance to change
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Finally destructive/passive reactions cover worry, fear, anxiety and helplessness,
accompanied by withdrawal and procrastination. Survivors can move from one quadrant
to another as outcomes materialise over time.
Harris and Ogbonna (1998) researched the influence of organisational culture
and developed a matrix of responses based on the strength of the culture (or sub-culture)
and willingness to change, producing nine types of reaction ranging from acceptance to
resistance. Rather than using a matrix of behaviours Herscovitch and Meyer (2002)
prefer the use of a continuum from active (overt) resistance, passive (covert) resistance,
compliance, cooperation, and championing. Similarly, but in reverse order, Coetsee
(1999) identifies responses to change moving from enthusiastic commitment through
lukewarm commitment and some ambivalence to resistance, which takes various forms,
starting from apathy and indifference, and moving through passive resistance and active
resistance to aggressive resistance. In the antecedent-outcome approach Huy’s (1999)
model of change dynamics incorporates receptivity as the outcome of cognitive and
emotional processes and ‘mobilization’ as the behavioural outcome.
Other researchers have used very different conceptual frameworks to depict
individual responses as they occur and change over time. Isabella (1990) indicates how
the way people think about an organisational change depends on the information they
receive and the sense they make of it. She drew a parallel between Lewin’s (1947)
process of unfreezing, changing and refreezing with interpretive stages of anticipation,
confirmation, culmination and aftermath. Trigger events at each stage, and the
information, absence or inaccuracy of information, that accompanies them, influence
people’s perceptions. Isabella acknowledges the emotional ramifications of this
cognitive processing but does not elaborate on them.
Other authors have described individual reactions to change as taking a
psychological route over time that sees people descend to what Elrod and Tippett (2002)
call the ‘death valley of change’, where people experience a variety of aversive
cognitive, affective and behavioural states, before rising to a more constructive
orientation. They provide an overview of 15 change models, several of which are based
on Kübler-Ross’ (1969) work on death and grieving. Kübler-Ross views people going
through various stages, each of which is replete with emotional experience. The first
stage is denial and isolation, which are buffers against anxiety. In the second stage,
anger, there are growing feelings of “anger, rage, envy and resentment” (p. 44). The
third stage, bargaining, is accompanied by guilt; the fourth, depression, is characterised
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by hopelessness and bitterness; and the fifth and final stage, acceptance, which apart
from some vestigial elements of hope, is almost “void of feelings” (p. 100).
While it might be going too far to suggest that death is similar to organisational
change, several of the authors cited by Elrod and Tippett (2002) use similar terminology
to Kübler-Ross (1969), including the words grieving and mourning. In the various
approaches they outline time is placed on one axis and other variables, such as self-
esteem, morale or performance, on the other axis, and they end with some form of
closure or accommodation. Some have more upward and downward phases than others.
Models of this nature take the view that change is a loss (or at least is initially perceived
as such by the individual) and that the reactions at the early and middle stages are
universally negative. Individual reactions to change can vary as processes and outcomes
become clearer and the various stages depicted in these models may be reached at
different times by different people, and it is not inevitable that people follow the same
trajectories or even the same stages. To some extent the models represent the route of a
rollercoaster and the articles by Goss et al. (1993) and Schneider and Goldwasser (1998)
actually contain graphics of the ‘rollercoaster of change’.
The reactions referred to by researchers reveal the wide range of possibilities.
Given the multi-faceted nature of both a change event and an individual’s reactions to it,
one cannot simply state, for example, that a positive judgement of a change and a
positive emotion will automatically lead to a positive behavioural or intentional
response. Peer group pressure may spur individual compliance with the change or
resistance to it. Similarly, a heavy workload could undermine a person’s willingness to
implement what appear to be acceptable changes. Behavioural outcomes of negative
cognitive and affective responses are particularly difficult to predict since employees
are aware of possible problems if they resist the change (Cunningham, 2006). Some
employees may argue a point and, if not successful, will accept the decision and move
on. With others, reluctance to accept outcomes may result in emotions that fester and
turn into something more toxic (Frost, 2004) and which may find an outlet in more
complaints or other negative forms of action. The nature of the change cannot be
ignored. A person may be unwilling to move to a new office block but will inevitably
do so if there are no other options, other than resignation. The later effects of any
change on performance and behaviour will vary from one person to another.
Employees with a modicum of political savvy will realise that certain forms of
behaviour, depending on the culture of the organisation or the management style of
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change leaders and managers, could have deleterious personal consequences, such as
dismissal, poor prospects for promotion and financial problems (Gross, 1998; Piderit,
2000). Disposition and emotional intelligence can also play significant roles in
responses to change and will be explored in more detail later.
I now explore more deeply the relationship between cognitive, affective and
behavioural reactions to change, and separate them into those that are broadly positive,
negative, neutral and mixed/ambivalent.
Firstly, positive responses occur when employees believe that the changes will
be beneficial to the organisation, to some of its external stakeholders, to groups of
employees or individuals (Cunningham, 2006; Matheny & Smollan, 2005). Herscovitch
and Meyer (2002) believe that there are three forms of commitment to change: affective
commitment (belief that change is a good idea), normative commitment (the view that
there is an obligation to comply), and continuance commitment (belief that one will pay
the price for non-compliance). Positive cognitions of the advantages of change, and
those which enhance issues of self-concept and psychological ownership (Dirks,
Cummings & Pierce, 1996), should lead to positive emotions that could range in
intensity from exhilaration and enthusiasm to pleasure and contentment (French, 2001;
Antonacopolou & Gabriel, 2001). Participation in decision-making enhances acceptance
of change when employees perceive a genuine commitment to engaging their views and
when the change outcomes are perceived as important (Lines, 2004). On the behavioural
level, employees willingly engage in the tasks expected of them (Woodward & Hendry,
2004) and may even attempt to exceed performance expectations. Organisational
Citizenship Behaviours (Spector & Fox, 2002), which encompass a range of pro-social
behaviours, such as helping others, showing initiative, altruistic actions, loyalty and
increased effort, may result. Cunningham (2006) found in an empirical study that
affective commitment to change was positively related to people’s beliefs that they
could cope with change. Change self-efficacy (Jimmieson et al., 2004; Herold, Fedor &
Caldwell, 2007; Holt et al., 2007), other dispositional variables, the fairness of change,
favourable outcomes and a range of other variables which will be dealt with elsewhere
in this study, contribute to positive responses.
When employees experience negative cognitive responses, accompanied by
negative emotions, such as fear or anger, they reject the changes (Kiefer, 2005). The
term ‘resistance to change’ was conceptualised by Lewin (1947) as part of a set of
restraining forces to counter other forces driving change. It permeates academic and
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practitioner literature and organisational conversations, and focuses on causes,
consequences and solutions. It therefore merits a detailed treatment here.
Oreg (2006) supports the view of Piderit (2000) that resistance to change must
be viewed from cognitive, affective and behavioural perspectives and found that
resistance to change has dispositional and contextual antecedents. George and Jones
(2001) propose that at the micro-level people may find that their own schemas may be
challenged by change. The seeds of resistance are sown here as the discrepancy between
present and future schemas is accompanied by negative emotions that signal the
significance of the change to the individual. Learned helplessness, denial and
complacency are affect-based reactions that contribute to resistance to change.
Surveying five textbooks on organisational behaviour and management, Dent
and Goldberg (1999) found that the most commonly cited causes of resistance were
misunderstanding, lack of trust, emotional side effects, personality conflicts, threats to
jobs status and security, work group break up, and uncertainty. Dirks et al. (1996, p. 11)
propose that change tends to be resisted when “it frustrates the individual’s ability to
fulfil his needs for self-enhancement, self-continuity, and control and efficacy” and
when the change is imposed, revolutionary and subtractive. Early empirical work on
resistance by Coch and French (1948) found that the resistance of factory workers to job
transfers was a motivational issue. Employees were reluctant to learn new skills since
they perceived that it would take too long to reach their earlier levels of output and pay.
The concept of loss as a cause of resistance to change has been explored by
several researchers. Loss of identity during change has been noted by Wolfram Cox
(1997), Fineman (2003), Carr (1999, 2001), Fiol and O’Connor (2002), and Bovey and
Hede (2001a), while Dirks et al. (1996) use the term ‘loss of psychological ownership’.
Interviews conducted by Wolfram Cox (1997) identified loss on a personal level, such
as of pay, status and skills, and on organisational and group levels, such as loss of
departments, union power, production and quality. Participants in the studies by Bryant
and Wolfram Cox (2006) and by Oreg (2006) reported loss of decision-making power.
In a Fortune magazine article on the nature of organisational change, Colvin (2006, p.
40) asserts, “All change creates winners and losers in an organization and the caveman
part of our brains is still wired to defend against loss”, and concludes rather glibly, “So
people almost always resist change.”
Injustice has been cited as a cause of resistance to change (Kiefer, 2002b;
Matheny & Smollan, 2005; Brotheridge, 2003; Cobb, Folger & Wooten, 1995; Paterson
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& Härtel, 2002), and includes breaches of the psychological contract (Shapiro, Lewicki
& Devine, 1995; Kickul, Lester & Finkl, 2002). This will be dealt with in more detail
later in the literature review (Research Question 4).
Bridges (1995, p. 197) denies that people resist change per se; it is the transition
between two states that is critical: 1. They resist saying goodbye to the world that has given them their identity and
their feelings of competence.
2. They resist the chaotic and confusing neutral zone, where everything is up for
grabs and no-one knows what the rules are.
3. And they resist taking the risk of trying something completely unfamiliar and
staking so much on a untried way of being and doing.
Another source of resistance to change is cynicism. Studies identify its
antecedents as partly dispositional (Wanberg & Banas, 2000; Wanous, Reichers &
Austin, 2000; Oreg, 2003, 2006) and partly situational (Connell & Waring, 2002; Oreg,
2006; Bareil, Savoie & Meunier, 2007; Walker, Armenakis & Bernerth, 2007). Stanley,
Meyer & Topolnytsky (2005) distinguish between change-scepticism (doubt about the
viability of a change project), and change-cynicism (disbelief about others’ motives).
They also believe that it is important to distinguish between general change cynicism
and specific-change cynicism. They developed or adapted measures for each of the
three constructs and tested them in two studies. They concluded that cynicism about a
specific change predicted resistance more strongly than general change cynicism. Their
studies focused on the cognitive elements of cynicism and pointed out that research
needs to be done on the affective elements and how cognitive and affective elements
influence behaviour. Cole, Bruch and Vogel (2006) found that negative emotion
predicted organisational cynicism in a change context. A number of other personality
factors lead to resistance to change, such as lack of openness to change, cognitive
rigidity, low change self-efficacy, external locus of control and negative affectivity (e.g.
Judge et al. 1997; Jimmieson et al., 2004; Herold et al., 2007; Holt et al., 2007; Oreg,
2003). These issues will be explored in more depth in Research Question 6.
The consequences of resistance manifest themselves in many ways. On an
affective level, which is of particular significance to this study, change has been
considered to evoke both positive and negative emotions, depending on contextual and
other variables. In one of the earliest studies Coch and French (1948) found evidence of
resentment, frustration and loss of hope. The downsizing literature naturally features
powerful negative emotions underpinning the resistance of victims, who obviously
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stand to lose the most (Ryan & Macky, 1998; Worrall et al., 2000). Survivors of
redundancy also resist change as perceptions of the adverse effects of change lead to
emotional reactions such as fear of increased work loads (O’Connell Davidson, 1994;
Shapiro & Kirkman, 1999), further job losses (Paterson & Cary, 2002), anxiety over the
inadequacy of skills to manage the change (Herold et al., 2007), anger at injustice
(Armstrong-Stassen, 1998), the loss of colleagues and lack of tangible and
psychological organisational support (Kiefer, 2005; Lines, 2004). Studies of mergers
have also produced perceptions of injustice, feelings of anxiety and resistance to change
(e.g. Chawla & Kelloway, 2004; Kiefer, 2002a, 20002b, 2005; Fugate, Kinicki &
Schreck, 2002; Totterdell et al., 2004).
As the models referred to earlier indicate (e.g. Piderit, 1999; Bovey & Hede
2001a, 2001b; Matheny, 2004) resistant behaviours can vary enormously. Resistance
can be seen as refusal to engage in the change or subverting it, but can also be
conceptualised as reluctance (Piderit, 2000; Ford et al., 2002), dissent (Piderit, 2000),
rejection (Coetsee, 1999), unreadiness (Armenakis, et al., 1993) or inertia (George &
Jones, 2001). Coch and French (1948) discovered that poorly planned job changes
resulted in grievances, reduced efficiency and output, and increased absenteeism,
turnover, and aggression against management. Further research has added disloyalty,
neglect, exit or intention to quit (Turnley & Feldman, 1999), lower trust (Kiefer, 2005;
Paterson & Cary, 2002; Brockner, Siegel, Daly, Tyler & Martin, 1997), active
campaigning against the change (Mishra & Spreitzer, 1998), deception (Shapiro et al.,
1995), sabotage (La Nuez & Jermier, 1994; O’Connell Davidson, 1994; Spector & Fox,
2002), violence and aggression (O’Connell Davidson, 1994; Spector & Fox, 2002;
Neuman & Baron, 1998), industrial action, such as strikes, walk outs, go-slows and
refusal to work or complete certain tasks (O’Connell Davidson, 1994; Skarlicki, Folger
& Tesluk, 1999). Researchers have used the terms Organisational Resistance
Behaviours (Skarlicki et al., 1999) and Counterproductive Work Behaviours (Spector &
Fox, 2002) to categorise a number of dysfunctional and anti-social behaviours, some of
which are targeted at organisational members, and some at the organisation itself.
The term resistance to change has been criticised by Dent and Goldberg (1999),
Krantz (1999) and Piderit (2000). They allege that it is overused, distorted and
oversimplified, and has achieved the status of received wisdom. Anticipated resistance
becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy whereby managers have been educated and trained to
see resistance as inevitable, negative and largely due to the ignorance or wilfulness of
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recalcitrant employees. Yet resistance is not always confined to ‘workers’ - managers
themselves are often sources of resistance too (Spreitzer & Quinn, 1996; La Nuez &
Jermier, 1994; Huy, 2002; Young, 2000).
Resistance has usually been seen as a nuisance, one that has to be managed,
eradicated or overcome (Coch & French, 1948; Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979). Schön
(1963) noted that resistance is not merely normal but at times also desirable, in order to
secure a balance between change and stability. Wolfram Cox (1997) argues that
individual resistance should be examined as a framework of loss, rather than one of
opposition, since it offers a more useful means of explaining the psychological response
to organisational change. Ford and Ford (2002) suggest that change has often been
constructed as a dialectical process of opposite forces; change driven by management,
and inertia maintained by employees. This process of opposition and confrontation, they
claim, is self-defeating and needs to be replaced by a new ‘logics of action’, a
‘trialectical’ approach which focuses on working on the attractiveness of organisational
change, rather than on overcoming resistance to change. This is similar to the approach
of Armenakis et al. (1993) in creating readiness for change.
Psychodynamic approaches have been used to analyse resistance to change.
Jarrett (2004, p. 247) claims that resistance is an ego-defensive strategy: “The heart of
resistance is primitive anxiety and fear”. Carr (1999; 2001), French (2001),
Antonacopoulou and Gabriel (2001) and Vince (2006) have likewise viewed resistance
to change as a deep-seated, identity-protecting mechanism.
Mills (2000) and Ford et al. (2002) see resistance as a socially constructed
phenomenon in which people interpret change through background conversations.
These discourses are not merely reports of the ‘reality’; they create perceptions of the
reality. Ford et al. (2002) identify three significant contexts that explain resistance to
change. In a background of complacency people deny the need for change, and
demonstrate procrastination, avoidance and withdrawal. In an environment of
resignation, employees passively but reluctantly accept change, which elicits emotional
responses of “despair, apathy, hopelessness, depression, sadness and listlessness” (p.
111). Behavioural resistance takes the form of non-compliance, which may be overt or
covert. A background of cynicism attributes failure to others and is accompanied by
pessimism, frustration and dissatisfaction, and on the behavioural level, by a range of
negative behaviours. They caution that unless those involved in designing and
implementing change understand these background conversations, and their causes, they
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will not succeed, even if they attempt to use strategies to overcome the resistance (e.g.
those proposed by Kotter and Schlesinger (1979), such as education and participation.
What is needed, they say, it to engage in the background conversations by creating
honest dialogue that examines assumptions and expectations and looks for
opportunities, while not avoiding the discussion of problems and how to solve them.
Bommer, Rich and Rubin (2005, p. 749) concluded from an empirical study that
“transformational leaders’ role in dealing with cynics is to ‘convert’ them to champions
of change without compromising their integrity or attempting to suppress their voice in
change efforts.” Huy (1999, p. 336) suggest that emotions themselves need to be
discussed: “Emotional conversations between change agents and their targets to co-
construct new meanings gradually increase understanding and receptivity to seemingly
controversial change proposals.”
Piderit (2000) also believes that the generation of widespread conversation about
the need for change is more productive than a top-down approach and agrees that
overselling the benefits of the change does not always work. She notes that negative
cognitive and affective responses are often well intentioned. They may result in actions
construed as appropriate, and which lead to further discussion and the implementation
of more acceptable, and possibly more beneficial, organisational outcomes.
In another call for “rethinking resistance” Jick and Peiperl (2003, p. 307)
encourage change managers to see it: As natural self-protection.
As a step toward change.
As energy to work with.
As information critical to the change process.
As other than a road block.
They also urge change managers to accept the emotions of change recipients as
natural outcomes of their responses and quote the words of Hultman as guidance: One of most common mistakes made by managers when they encounter resistance is to
become angry, frustrated, impatient or exasperated…The problem with an emotional
reaction is that it increases the probability that resistance will intensify. Remember that
anger directed towards others is likely to make them afraid and angry in return (Hultman,
1979, cited in Jick & Peiperl, 2003, p. 308).
Responding in this way will require considerable levels of emotional
intelligence (Vakola et al., 2004; Jordan, 2005) as it requires change managers to
manage their own emotions as well as those of the change recipients.
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Change is often experienced as having both positive and negative aspects
(Fugate et al., 2008; Piderit, 1999, 2000), and some aspects might be resisted and others
supported. Mixed or ambivalent behaviours are probable when there are mixed thoughts
and feelings, and reactions to some change events might be neutral. Promotion might
bring extra travel, self-doubt and stress. For a survivor, downsizing may lead to an
enriched job. The complexity of consequences causes confusion. As Fineman (2003, p.
121) puts it, “Fear can coexist with exhilaration, liking with disliking, loving with
frustration, suspicions with delight. Resolving, or learning to accept, these tensions is
part of the struggle of change.”
It is also likely that some people will experience neither favourable nor
unfavourable cognitive or affective reactions. For example, some employees may
respond to the move to an intranet-based leave application or remuneration advice
system with a neutral or indifferent attitude. The change may require no extra effort and
have outcomes perceived as either positive or negative. Compliance or ‘submissive
collaboration’ (Bacharach, Bamberger & Sonnenstul, 1996) are likely outcomes.
The vast array of possible cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to
organisational change depend on factors that lie within the change itself, within the
individuals, within their perceptions of change leaders, managers and agents, and within
the organisational context. These factors are explored in the next section and
incorporated into a model of change.
2.5 Development of a new model of cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to
organisational change
Introduction
I have referred to many models of individual change. Because they looked at the
relationships between cognition, emotion and behaviour I found the most influential
were those by Gibson (1995), Weiss and Cropanzano (1996), Piderit (1999; 2000),
Paterson and Härtel (2002), Paterson and Cary (2002), Brotheridge (2003), Kiefer
(2005) and Szabla (2007).
According to Lau and Woodman (1995, p. 550), “Any model is an abstraction
from reality, and researchers must make difficult choices as to what should be included
and what should be left out.” My model (see Figure 4) is designed to include as many
factors affecting individual responses to organisational change as possible.
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Figure 4: Model of cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to organisational change
The model proposes that an organisational change event triggers individual
cognitive evaluations, which evoke possible emotional reactions and the cognitive and
affective processes result in behavioural outcomes. Before acting, most people consider
the outcomes of their actions (Piderit, 2000) and possibly moderate their behaviour. On
the other hand, people may respond spontaneously and ‘from the heart’, without
carefully analysing the possible consequences. Bargh and Chartrand (1999) conducted a
series of experiments that revealed that many thoughts operate below the level of
consciousness and that these induce behaviour that is also not consciously thought
through. Emotion regulation, according to Gross (1998, p. 288), provides “a middle
course between silencing the emotions and listening to them and them alone.”
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses can be positive, negative, neutral or
mixed.
The focus in this thesis is on emotional responses to change. According to the
cognitive approach to the study of emotions (Lazarus, 1991, 2006; Ortony et al., 1988;
Scherer, 1999) affective reactions to events arise after a process of thought. Employees’
positive or negative evaluations of a change event are mediated by their perceptions of
the nature of the change, notably the favourability of outcomes, the scale, the frequency,
Affective responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Cognitive responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Behavioural responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Cognitive appraisal of change event(s)’ perceived: 1. Favourability of outcomes 2. Scale 3. Frequency, timing and speed 4. Justice
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the change leader(s)/manager(s)/ agent(s)’ perceived: 9. Leadership ability 10. Emotional intelligence 11. Trustworthiness
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the employee’s: 5. Emotional intelligence 6. Disposition 7. Previous experience of change 8. Change and stress outside the
workplace
Cognitive evalua- tion of potential behavioural responses
Change event(s)
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the organisation’s perceived: 12. Culture 13. Change context
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timing and speed, and the fairness of it. Mediation occurs when “an active organism
intervenes between stimulus and response” and “(m)ediators explain how external
physical events take on internal psychological significance” (Baron & Kenny, 1986, p.
1176). All of the mediating variables in the model can individually, or in combination,
evoke emotions in those involved in change. The complexity of the cognitive and
affective processes becomes particularly evident when some aspects of the change are
considered positive and others negative.
In contrast, “a moderator is a qualitative…or quantitative…variable that affects
the strength and/or direction of the relation between an independent predictor variable
and a dependent or criterion variable” (Baron & Kenny 1986, p. 1174). Three sets of
factors moderate the cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change, some of
which relate to the individual (emotional intelligence, disposition, previous experience
of change, and change and stress outside the workplace); some relate to the individual’s
perception of factors relating to change leaders, managers and agents (emotional
intelligence, leadership ability and trustworthiness); and some relate to the individual’s
perception of the organisation (its culture and the change context). There are many
potential overlaps between the various constructs. For example, there are several
personality characteristics, such as empathy, which are considered to be embedded in
the constructs of leadership, emotional intelligence, trust, justice and disposition. The
model can be seen as linear, circular or multi-directional. While a change event triggers
cognitions and emotions that lead to individual behaviour, the behaviour itself can have
outcomes that impact on further cognitions and emotions, and possibly on the change
itself (Bacharach et al., 1996).
To illustrate, a theoretical example is provided of the responses from an
individual point of view. A change of structure is announced by senior management.
One individual, a middle manager, considers the new structure to be weak, is anxious
about it, and complains to senior management. After discussion, his/her views are taken
into account and a variation of the structure is implemented. This may elicit different
cognitions and emotions in the middle manager, who now accepts the change. Or
perhaps the outcome is messier still, and the manager rallies support from others, and
after considerable interaction some changes are made and others are not, and thus the
nature of the thoughts, feelings and actions of the manager may again alter. The entire
change experience depicted above is characterised by complexity, fluidity and politics
(Dawson, 2003; Buchan & Badham, 1999), as cognitive, affective and behavioural
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reactions are influenced by new information, procedures and outcomes (Kiefer, 2005;
Paterson & Cary, 2002; Mills, 2000). Kiefer (2005) notes that while one specific change
event, small or large, has certain consequences for individuals, ongoing change involves
a more complex set of dynamics. One change therefore needs to be seen in the context
of others.
The model therefore has similarities to other models in that the emotions of
change have cognitive antecedents and behavioural outcomes, and since organisational
change occurs over varying periods of time affective states will alter. My model differs
from previous models in various ways. First, Weiss and Cropanzano’s (1996) model is
not specifically directed at (but may include) organisational change. Second, my model
aims to embrace all types of change, unlike Paterson and Härtel’s (2002) and Paterson
and Cary’s (2002) focus on downsizing, and Kiefer’s (2005) concentration on ongoing
and multiple changes. Third, it involves a wider range of variables than most of the
models, which do not directly explore the role of leadership ability, change and stress
outside the workplace, or organisational culture. Fourth, it embraces positive and
negative emotions while Kiefer’s model focuses only on negative emotions. Fifth, the
concept of justice permeates the contributions of Paterson and Cary and Kiefer, but
while both identify trust as an outcome of change, my model identifies trust as a
variable that moderates cognitive, affective and behavioural responses. Sixth,
Brotheridge’s (2003) model was primarily focused on the mediating effects of
perceptions of organisational justice and was therefore not concerned with as wide a
range of variables, and it also concentrated on the stressful aspects of change. Seventh,
Gibson’s (1995) model emerged from a study of cognitive and affective responses to
change but did not categorise the critical variables that lead to them. Eighth, while
Paterson and Härtel’s model discusses the impact of employees’ emotional intelligence
on their abilities to cope with change, mine also addresses employees’ perceptions of
the emotional intelligence of change leaders, managers and agents. Finally, the models
of Piderit (1999) and Szabla (2007) are fundamentally about resistance to change and
less about positive reactions.
My model thus makes a contribution to the literature by focussing on a wider
range of factors that influence any form of organisational change than presented in other
models. What now follows is an explanation of why each of the 13 factors have been
included in the model. At the end of each subsection the research questions are posed.
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Variables Mediating Cognitive Responses to Change
Before a cognitive judgement of an organisational change takes place, people use a
number of lenses through which they view the change. These lenses act as mediators
(Baron & Kenny, 1986) because the cognitive evaluation of the change as positive,
negative, neutral or mixed depends on the individual’s perception of the nature of the
change. In this section four mediators are discussed: perceived favourability of
outcomes of change, perceived scale of the change, perceived frequency, timing and
speed of the change, and perceived justice of the change. The purposes of the research
questions in this section are twofold. The first is to investigate how the variable
mediates cognitive evaluations of the change. The second is to identify the emotions
that arise from the cognitive evaluations and the behavioural outcomes.
Perceived Favourability of Outcomes of Change
Change has often been portrayed as a negative (Kiefer, 2005) and stressful (Brotheridge,
2003) event where some stakeholders will lose out and face difficult processes in doing
so (Kruglanski, Pierro, Higgins & Capozza, 2007). It also has many positive aspects: Change also poses challenge and affords opportunity. It does away with boring routines,
enabling advancement and exploration. It shakes away stagnation and that ‘business-as-
usual’ feeling. It generates dynamism and the potential for progress. It breeds excitement
and a sense of going places. In short, it has a significant bright side, alongside its darker,
duress-inducing aspects (Kruglanski et al., 2007, p. 1306).
Outcomes of change that are perceived as favourable tend to produce positive
affective reactions (Matheny & Smollan, 2005), such as happiness from obtaining a
better office, relief at escaping redundancy and pride from a promotion. Negative
outcomes generate negative emotions such as fear of losing one’s management role,
anger at an increased workload, or disgust at the way junior staff are treated. Where
employees find it difficult to predict outcomes their responses will remain either neutral
or ambivalent, until more information becomes available and outcomes are realised or
become clearer. If people anticipate that change will bring only modest benefits (Fugate
et al., 2008), or do not see it as particularly relevant, they will have a tepid response at
best. If the change is seen as useful, but requires effort to deal with it, it may be seen as
a lower priority than other tasks, and in this case responses are also likely to be
ambivalent.
One could expect that a move to self-managing work teams would produce
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favourable responses since they are often considered to increase participation in
decision-making and feelings of empowerment and autonomy (see Rasmussen and
Jeppersen, 2006, for an overview of research). However, Shapiro and Kirkman (1999)
surveyed employees who were moving to self-managing work teams and found
considerable resistance, increased turnover intentions and lower organisational
commitment, consequences also detailed in the meta-analysis of Rasmussen and
Jeppersen (2006). The main reason was that employees feared unfair and unfavourable
outcomes such as increased workload and responsibility.
Disposition (which will be considered in more depth in Research Question 6)
can play a significant role. For example, optimists and pessimists will anticipate
different outcomes (Wanberg & Banas, 2000). Mixed outcomes, for example a bigger
salary but a more stressful workload, will lead to mixed cognitive, affective and
behavioural reactions (Kiefer, 2002b). Fedor et al. (2006) concluded from their
empirical study that employees were more committed to change where outcomes were
favourable and when they did not have to do much. They suggest that change can result
in uncertainty and fear of failure to adapt, and the effort required to make change work
may be a source of negative attitudes to change.
An outcome of change can be perceived by a person involved in terms of its
nature, timeframe and focus on different stakeholders.
Firstly, a number of useful concepts from the literatures on the psychological
contract and organisational justice explore the nature of individual outcomes of
organisational practices and decisions. While justice concepts are analysed in more
depth in Research Question 4 in this literature review, the distinctions between types of
outcome could be helpful in analysing how organisational personnel view change.
Lester and Kickul (2001) distinguish between intrinsic and extrinsic outcomes in
their discussion of the psychological contract, which is the employee’s perception of
mutual obligations between him or her and the organisation. Intrinsic outcomes relate to
the work environment (for example, communication and managerial support) and the
job itself (such as responsibility, authority and meaningful work), while extrinsic
outcomes relate to the consequences of performing the job (such as salary and benefits).
They found that participants in their study rated eight of the most important ten
outcomes as intrinsic. Changes to the psychological contract can impact on both types
of outcomes (Kickul et al., 2002) and when they are seen as unfair, job satisfaction,
performance and intentions to remain decline.
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The procedural justice literature provides a number of similar terms about the
nature of outcomes. Tyler and Lind (1992) criticised the instrumental view of Thibaut
and Walker (1975) that people are only concerned that procedures should deliver
favourable tangible outcomes for themselves. They proposed a parallel group-relational
model that states that people also see outcomes in terms of social status, dignity,
belongingness and validations of self-identity. Brockner and Wiesenfeld (1996) refer to
outcomes as being economic, concrete and material, or as psychological, whereas
Cropanzano and Ambrose (2001) distinguish between economic and socioemotional
outcomes. Apart from the relevance of perceptions of fairness in responding to change,
the main point of these various concepts is that people can conceptualise outcomes of
organisational change in different ways and that all of them can produce emotional
reactions. Research into identity has revealed that people’s sense of self is often
wrapped in their jobs and careers, and when organisational change disrupts identity it
produces negative emotional responses (Ashforth & Mael, 1989; Carr, 2001).
Secondly, outcomes of change can also be framed in terms of how long they
last. An organisational change could have negative consequences, such as extra work or
extra travel in the short term (during the change process), but have longer-term
consequences, such as a new role or higher salary (after the change has been
implemented). It is conceivable that longer-term outcomes will produce stronger
emotional reactions. Coping with negative outcomes is easier in the short-term while the
prospect of enjoying positive outcomes is particularly welcome with a longer-term
perspective. The uncertainty of some outcomes is itself a temporary outcome of a
change process and can tax people’s coping resources (Rafferty & Griffin, 2006; Fugate
et al., 2008). The longer one has to wait the greater is the potential anxiety or frustration
(Fedor et al., 2006; Schein, 2004). The frequency of change also becomes a factor, as
the outcomes of some types of change seem to be short-lived (Rafferty & Griffin,
2006). People will be reluctant to put effort into an outcome they perceive will be of
limited duration, as they wait for the latest management ‘hot idea’ to materialise.
Thirdly, people’s perceptions of change are focused on outcomes for different
stakeholders. Change events can produce wins and losses for an individual (Bartunek et
al., 2006; Wolfram Cox, 1997) and there may be differing outcomes for various
stakeholders (Paterson & Cary, 2002; Fedor et al., 2006). For example, the results of
downsizing for victims and survivors will obviously be vastly different. Most victims
will think that the loss of their jobs is unfortunate and experience emotions such as
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“social isolation, helplessness and anxiety”, resulting in “reduced self-esteem,
depression and minor psychiatric morbidity” (Ryan & Macky, 1998, p. 33). Survivors
too may experience negative perceptions when colleagues lose jobs, social relationships
are fractured, and increased workloads are predicted or experienced. Redundancies are
accompanied by “highly emotional responses synonymous with grieving such as shock,
anger, denial, guilt and fear” with survivors becoming “less-aversive to risk, indecisive
and demotivated” (Worrall, Campbell & Cooper, 2000, p. 463). Survivors may also
experience positive emotions (particularly relief) and the model of Mishra and Spreitzer
(1998), referred to earlier, lays out a number of constructive affective and behavioural
responses. Survivors of downsizing have also been noted to experience grief at the loss
of colleagues, guilt that they themselves had escaped the axe, and anxiety that they may
not do so the next time (Brockner, 1992; Paterson & Cary, 2002). There is also a
difference between those who are declared ‘at risk’ (Armstrong-Stassen, 2002) or
perceive themselves at risk, and those who are not. Those at risk are likely to experience
more negative emotional reactions. The leaders and managers of downsizing also have
to deal with a gamut of negative emotions, such as guilt, anxiety and concern (Clair &
Dufresne, 2004; Gandolfi, 2008).
Employees will therefore analyse the favourability of outcomes for themselves,
other staff, for the organisation itself, and possibly for external stakeholders. This was
confirmed by Matheny and Smollan (2005) in an empirical study which found that
people experienced a range of positive and negative emotions relating to outcomes for
each of these stakeholders. Outcomes for self produced a higher degree of emotional
intensity than did outcomes for other people or the organisation. It is natural that most
people view a change event with the prime focus on personal outcomes. Events that
facilitate the attainment of goals will result in positive emotions and those which
prevent them produce negative emotions (Frijda, 1988; Gibson, 1995; Lazarus, 2006).
Outcomes for other stakeholders (including the organisation itself) are seen as being of
lesser importance. As one of the respondents in another study of change observed, “I
recognized some time ago that my priorities were really myself, secondly those who
work for me and around me, and thirdly the organization” (Vince, 2006, p. 353).
Evaluation of outcomes often involves comparison with others and perceived
unfairness produces anger (Homans 1961). Adams (1965) Equity theory states that
when people see an imbalance they take psychological and practical steps to restore the
balance. These issues will be explored more fully in Research Question 4 on the role of
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organisational justice perceptions.
Evaluation of the favourability of outcomes of change, both the more tangible
and less tangible, can trigger emotions that depend on a range of factors that lie within
the individual and the organisation.
Research Question 1a: How does perceived favourability of the outcomes of
change mediate cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 1b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
Perceived Scale of the Change
The typologies of change referred to earlier in the literature review (see Table 3)
distinguished between major and minor changes and for the former used terms such as
gamma (Golembiewski et al., 1976; Porras & Silvers, 1991), second order (Watzlawick,
et al., 1974; Bartunek & Moch, 1987; Porras & Robertson, 1992), third order (Bartunek
& Moch, 1987), transformational (French et al., 2005; Dunphy & Stace 1988, 1990),
recreations and reorientations (Tushman & Romanelli, 1985), and evolutionary and
radical (Greenwood & Hinings, 1996).
These conceptualisations of organisational change are usually seen from the
perspective of the organisation but individual employees tend to focus more on the
impact of the change on their own jobs and conditions of service (Lau & Woodman,
1995). Therefore what is considered a major change at organisational level may have
little impact on an individual and conversely a minor organisational change may be
perceived by an individual to have major personal implications and thus trigger stronger
cognitive and emotional responses (Bovey & Hede, 2001b; Fedor et al., 2006;
Mossholder et al., 2000). For example, a major strategic change may have little impact
on the catering or cleaning staff of an organisation but a change in personal work
schedules may have more serious implications for some of them. Moreover, even within
similar groups there could be different individual reactions (Caldwell, Herold & Fedor,
2004).
The greater the magnitude of the personal change the more potential there is for
intense emotions. Dirks et al. (1996) propose that individuals with a strong sense of
psychological ownership of some aspect of their jobs will find revolutionary change
threatening, and tend to resist it. George and Jones (2001) argue that changes to existing
schemata will have a more profound impact on people than changes within the schemata
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themselves, a point also made by Gersick (1991). While positive change outcomes may
engender positive reactions (French, 2001) the sheer size of the change, or too many
new events occurring simultaneously (Blount & Janicik, 2001; Kiefer, 2005), may result
in negative judgements. In a study of a technological change among police officers over
60 per cent of respondents believed the scale of change was big because of the impact it
had on their jobs (Collerette, Legris & Manghi, 2006). While frequency of change is
discussed in more detail in the next research question, it should be noted here that its
cumulative effect can create the perception of increased scale as well.
Similarly, the size of the change and its fast pace may have dire consequences
for employees. The economic crisis that suddenly mushroomed in September 2008 has
seen major changes taking place in terms of bank failures, mergers, takeovers and
redundancies. The collapse in April 2008 of a major financial institution reveals the
emotional damage of sudden, major, negative change: In a week it was all gone: Bear Stearns’ reputation, culture, identity, the savings of many of
its 14,000 employees; and possibly their jobs too. “The speed of the collapse was
traumatic,” says one banker who has worked at Bear for a decade. “People aren’t jumping
out of windows’ he says, “but we are all kind of anxious” (Berfield, Silver-Greenberg and
Lehman, 2008, p. 35).
The term burnout can also be related to both frequency and scale of change and
describes the condition of people who have had to put in a huge effort to deal with
significant change(s) (Halbesleben & Buckley, 2004). The symptoms of burnout,
according to Maslach and Jackson (1981, p. 99), are emotional exhaustion (“feelings of
anger, embarrassment, fear or despair”), depersonalisation and a reduced sense of
achievement. Burnout could occur due to the effort required to implement the change or
from the ongoing demands of the job after the change. Greenglass and Burke (2002)
studied restructuring in hospital services which involved layoffs, other financial
cutbacks and reduction in the quality of facilities and services. They found considerable
burnout experienced as a result of these multiple changes and the added anxiety of
reduced job security. To some extent burnout was mitigated by individual variables,
such as self-efficacy.
Negative cognitive evaluations that the size of the change is too much to cope
with (for the individual or other stakeholders) can provoke strong affective responses.
Bovey and Hede (2001b) surveyed people who had experienced a major change and
found anxiety to be the predominant affective response, and noted a variety of adaptive
and maladaptive defence mechanisms.
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Huy’s (2002) research over three years into radical change in a large firm, which
staged a wide number of change projects, identified the strong affective reactions that
accompanied the processes. Focussing on the role of middle managers he found that
pleasant high activation emotions (e.g. excitement and optimism) were evident when
managers committed to the change but were often counter-balanced by negative low
activation emotions (e.g. fatigue and disappointment). These managers had to
simultaneously attend to the emotions of the staff for whom they were responsible, and
here too they encountered both positive and negative emotions.
Mossholder et al. (2000) gathered data from managers in a large company that
initiated restructuring from a functional to divisional approach, which resulted in
downsizing. They found that radical range heightened arousal of positive and negative
emotions. They noted that managers need to act with caution in aiming to generate high
emotional activation if there is not an accompanying cognitive readiness for the change.
Kiefer (2002b) theorised that radical organisational change results in emotions
occurring more frequently and more intensely. Empirical testing of reactions to a
merger produced evidence of a wide range of positive and negative emotions, some of
which were due to specific aspects of the change, some due to the range of change
initiatives. Another research study in the same organisation led her to conclude that
ongoing organisational change leads to more negative emotions (Kiefer, 2005). Rafferty
and Griffin (2006) reported change frequency placing extra demands on the coping
skills of people involved in organisational change. Issues of timing and frequency of
change will be explored in more depth in the next research question.
Researchers are therefore in agreement that perceptions of the impact of the
scale of a change are focused mostly on oneself, partly on others, and lead to emotional
reactions that tap and tax people’s ability to cope with the change. When people feel
they can cope, negative emotional arousal, if there is any, tends to be more muted
(Folkman & Lazarus, 1988).
Research Question 2a: How do perceptions of the scale of change mediate
cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 2b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
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Perceived Frequency, Timing and Speed of the Change
Time as an element of organisational life has been the subject of special issues of The
Academy of Management Review and the Journal of Organizational Change
Management (for overviews see Ancona, Okhuysen and Perlow, 2001, and Carr and
Hancock, 2006). The relationship also appears frequently in the journal, Time and
Society. Research shows that the temporal dimensions of the frequency, timing and
speed of organisational change have distinct but also overlapping aspects. Firstly,
frequency literally means how often change occurs, but a lot of related changes could
also add up to a large scale change and include simultaneous and/or consecutive shifts
in strategy, structure, operations and culture (Porras & Robertson, 1992; Dunphy &
Stace, 1988, 1990; Tushman & Romanelli, 1985). Secondly, pacing can refer to the
speed, timing or frequency of change (Gersick 1994; Sastry, 1997; Eisenhardt & Brown,
1998; Huy, 2001; Collerette et al., 2006). In this context Jansen (2000, 2004) refers to
change-based momentum as the energy required to maintain the direction, trajectory and
pace of the change over a period of time and which is facilitated by constant
communication about its progress. Thirdly, changes to individual work schedules could
be related to speed and sequencing, and the latter could be a function of the order and/or
timing of events.
According to Ancona et al. (2001) and Pettigrew, Woodman and Cameron
(2001), time is socially constructed as different national and ethnic cultures place their
own meanings on the concept of time. When translated to the organisational world,
particularly in a Western context, time is literally seen as money, and the managerial
urge to get things done quickly becomes paramount. Clark (1990, p. 143) complains
that the conventional model of time in organisation science is inaccurately depicted as
“objective, absolute, homogeneous, linear, evenly-flowing, measurable, readily divisible
and independent of events”. Even in Western models there are different interpretations
of the urgency of time between countries, and between different geographical regions
within countries. Anecdotal personal experience, for example, indicates that people
conceive of major financial centres in one country (e.g. New York, London, Sydney or
Auckland) as being more time-conscious than in smaller cities (e.g. Los Angeles,
Bristol, Brisbane or Christchurch). Cultural variations can impact on how different
branches of a multi-national company, or different ethnic groups within that company,
would approach an organisational change. Within an organisation time could also be
differently constructed (Ancona et al. 2001). For example, the sales team might have a
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much greater sense of urgency in introducing an innovation than the research and
development team. As Pettigrew et al. (2001, p. 700) indicate: the change scholar needs also to be mindful that time is more than just clock time or
chronology. Time is not just ‘out there’ as neutral chronology, but also ‘in here’ as a social
construction. Thus there is the constant challenge to study events and the social
construction of events in the context of the local organizational time cycles that modulate
the implicit rhythms of social systems.
Temporal issues in organisational change can impact on how employees react on
cognitive and affective levels but insufficient empirical evidence has been produced to
date. Huy (2001, p. 62), who observed, interviewed and surveyed employees in an
organisation undergoing radical change, has contrasted the objective, quantitative
conceptualisation of ‘clock’ time from what he calls qualitative or inner time, and
advises management to be aware of this, since “subjective temporal experiences
represent potential sources of psychological stress.” If a change is made too quickly, at
the wrong time, or too soon after another change, people can view it negatively and
experience anxiety or anger.
The frequency of the change
The mantra, ‘the only constant is change’, is indicative of popular perceptions of the
ongoing nature of organisational (and other types of) change. Researchers of
organisational change at the macro-level (e.g. Weick & Quinn, 1999) have used the
term continuous change. At the micro-level ongoing change can be exhausting, deplete
a person’s emotional resilience and coping skills (Huy, 2002; Kiefer, 2005; Woodward
& Hendry, 2004; Rafferty & Griffin, 2006) and lead to stress and burnout (Brotheridge,
2003; Greenglass & Burke, 2002; Leiter & Maslach, 2001).
The types of change experienced will make an impact with negative outcomes
naturally producing negative emotions. However, even changes with positive outcomes
and positive emotions can produce a negative cumulative effect because of the constant
adaptation that is necessary in undertaking extra and new tasks. The Holmes-Rahe Scale
(1967) measures the stress from each type of life change, positive and negative, and a
total score is one measure of stress. This has been extended by Rahe et al. (2000) to
include a wider range of changes, including those related to work.
Empirical work has produced some evidence of the emotional impact of change
frequency. Wolfram Cox (1997) researched an organisation that over 18 months made
changes in team structures, pay, shifts, jobs and staffing levels, and while she found a
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range of negative emotions, she did not specifically comment on the cumulative effect
of these changes. However, Connell and Waring (2002), reporting on three longitudinal
case studies of organisational change, declared that a succession of change initiatives
led to employee cynicism, through the belief that change leads to negative outcomes of
greater workload, restructuring, redeployment and redundancy. Kiefer’s (2005) study of
ongoing change confirmed that it produced mainly negative emotions but that these
were mediated by perceptions of personal status and security, working conditions and
organisational trust. Woodward and Hendry’s (2004) investigation of multiple changes
in the financial service industry in London led them to indicate that both leaders and
recipients of change need emotion-focused and problem-focused skills (Folkman &
Lazarus, 1988). Rafferty & Griffin (2006) found that change frequency was negatively
related to job satisfaction and positively to turnover intentions and was mediated
through uncertainty. Herold et al. (2007) discovered in their study that pervasive change
undermined commitment to change.
Burnout was indentified in the previous research question as a consequence of
the scale of the change. It is also associated with the stress of ongoing demands, one of
which could be constant adapting to change. Greenglass and Burke (2002) reported on
the burnout of nurses who had to cope with multiple changes and reduced resources. In
his research at GE, Huy (2002) found considerable emotional exhaustion in managers
who had experienced eight years of restructuring.
The timing of the change
Timing of change refers to when change should be made and four concepts can be
applied. Firstly, it can relate to frequency. If a large change has several phases the
timing of these changes can have an impact on people. For example, to implement a
strategic change often requires cultural, structural and operational changes. Even an
operational change, such as a technological change, might require several phases. A
pause between phases allows those involved to recoup the energy used but may
diminish momentum (Jansen, 2004). Combining the concepts of frequency and timing,
Abrahamson (2000, p. 77) maintains that “to change successfully companies should
stop changing all the time. Instead, they should intersperse major change initiatives
among carefully paced periods of smaller, organic change.” He outlines the strategies
used by one of IBM’s CEOs, Lou Gerstner, who was “alert to early signs of change
fatigue: cynicism and burnout” (p. 78) and carefully planned the timing of changes.
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Secondly, timing also relates to sequencing or the order of the discrete phases of
the planned change. For example, a change in strategy could necessitate a change in
structure, culture and various operations. The sequencing of these changes therefore
becomes important (Pettigrew et al., 2001) on cognitive, affective and behavioural
levels.
Thirdly, timing could refer to changes in individual work schedules, and in this
context it could relate to a change in when work gets done, in what order and at what
speed. According to Blount and Janicik (2001) a number of reactions can be expected
from staff involved. ‘Hastenings’ can provoke anxiety if people feel they cannot adjust
in time. Delays may be resented if they disrupt expectations and if people have
dispositional impatience, unless the change is unwanted, in which case any delay is
welcome.
Fourthly, timing can be seen as a politically astute or inept way of managing a
specific aspect of the change. Newspaper reports reveal the unhappiness of various
stakeholders when executives received a sizeable bonus after a downsizing (Ward,
2006), when redundancies were announced at the same time as record profits (Huy &
Mintzberg, 2003) and when the “organisation design committee”, which was planning a
reported 350 redundancies in another organisation, was given “a slap-up meal at a top
Auckland eatery” (TVNZ top brass feast, 2007, p. 1). Once again it is perceived
inequity that appears to be the overriding factor, but the relevance of the appropriate
timing of stages of the change process should not be overlooked.
The speed of the change
The swift collapse of finance house Bear Stearns in 2008, mentioned earlier, came as a
surprise to many and the worldwide economic crisis that erupted later in the year did
likewise. There is little management literature dealing with individual responses to the
speed of change and most research has focused on organisational pacing from a
strategic and tactical perspective (e.g. Gersick, 1994; Sastry, 1997; Eisenhardt &
Brown, 1998). Cameron (2006, p. 317) suggests, “not only is change ubiquitous and
unpredictable, but almost everyone also assumes that its velocity will increase
exponentially.” Bridges (2003, p. 102) claims, “the hardest thing to deal with is not the
pace of change but changes in the acceleration of that pace.” While a fast pace can be
used to create energy and momentum (Meyer & Stensaker, 2006; Jansen, 2004), if it is
deemed too fast employees may believe they cannot take the necessary steps in time, or
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do so with severe disruption to normal routines, and they are likely to react negatively
(Blount & Janicik, 2001; Huy, 2001; Meyer & Stensaker, 2006). Psychological
adaptation to something different may play as much of a role as the effort taken to get to
grips with new skills, requirements and schedules.
A number of empirical studies have identified the cognitive and affective
consequences of fast-paced change. Two separate studies of nurses found considerable
unhappiness with the fast pace of change (Andrews, Manthorpe & Watson, 2005; Ball,
2006) and in the latter study dissatisfaction was significantly higher in settings where
there had been redundancies. Some research has linked affective reactions to the speed
of change to perceived justice. For example, Riolli’s and Savicki’s (2006) research
showed that when participants were given too little information about a rapid
technological change, and no opportunity to ask questions or make comments, they
reported greater strain and burnout than those given more opportunity to listen to
explanations and raise questions. However, the speed of change appeared to be less
relevant than the fairness of the communication. Respondents in Wolfram Cox’s (1997)
study of multiple changes revealed the unhappiness of staff who believed that the pace
of change had left no time for consultation. Here too it was not clear whether the critical
issue was perception of an inadequate period of time to adapt to the change, or of the
fairness of the way in which the change was designed and communicated. Self,
Armenakis and Schraeder (2007) suggest that if change recipients perceive speed of
change as important, they would not necessarily expect participation.
Huy (2001) believes that the type of change influences the speed of change and
the leadership style that should be used to drive it. For example, he suggests that
strategic or operational changes can be implemented quickly with commanding or
engineering approaches but changing beliefs and social relationships require more
measured teaching or socialising interventions: Teachers have to be patient and value a time perspective that is moderately long, since
changes in fundamental beliefs constitute, for the most part, a gradual and voluntary
process and cannot be imposed with raw power (p. 608)….Socializers tend to have a long
term perspective. To build trust they typically move at a patient pace and do not rush their
targets into submission (p. 610).
Change leaders, managers and agents should therefore be aware of how the
frequency, timing and speed of change can best be managed, not only from strategic and
operational perspectives, but also from the human perspective. Change recipients need
to acknowledge that ongoing change can be overly demanding and that they will need
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appropriate emotion management skills and organisational support to deal with it. The
impact of separate and combined temporal dimensions of change can tax people
severely and these effects can be exacerbated by perceptions of injustice, inappropriate
leadership styles and lack of perceived organisational support.
Research Question 3a: How do aspects of frequency, speed and timing of
change mediate cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 3b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
Perceived Justice of the Change
Employees’ cognitive and affective responses to change are tempered by their
perceptions of fairness (for an overview of research see Bernerth, Armenakis, Field and
Walker, 2007). The tangled roots of organisational justice lie in the fields of religion,
ethics, politics, philosophy, sociology, psychology, management and organisational
behaviour. It is surprising, as Bies and Tripp (2002) point out, that the role of emotion
has been ignored in much of the research despite its ubiquitous appearance. “The sense
of injustice…the anger, the bitterness, the fears, the helplessness. These are emotions
that all people have experienced on the job, some more frequently than others and some
more intensely than others” (p. 204).
One way in which people try to make sense of events (including change) is by
analysing how fair they are (Brockner, 2002). Perceptions of justice are usually
subjective, and depend on personal experience, values and personality (Brennan &
Skarlicki, 2004). The view has also been expressed that justice is a socially constructed
concept (Tyler & Bies, 1991; Lamertz, 2002; Colquitt, Yee Ng, Wesson & Porter,
2001), in that people’s views are based on a variety of environmental forces. Harris
(2006), for example, suggests that the broad concept of inequality is socially
determined. Justice perceptions often differ from one ethnic or national setting to
another and in organisational contexts problems could occur if standards required in one
organisational setting are applied to another (Greenberg, 2001a). Taken a step further,
even within a culturally homogenous workforce, employees’ perceptions of
organisational justice partly depend on what their colleagues and managers think.
Lamertz (2002) surveyed people in an organisation that had experienced considerable
reorganisation and downsizing and found that they made sense of the change through
justice judgements that partly depended on those expressed by their peers and partly on
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the quality of the relationships they had with management. The ways in which
management communicates information about decisions (Tyler & Bies, 1991), for
example, about the need for an upcoming change, becomes part of the discourse about
change and helps shape employee opinions about fairness.
The considerable body of research into organisational justice has identified
elements that are both distinct and overlapping and there is considerable debate about
taxonomies of justice (for overviews see Greenberg, 1987, 1990, 1993; Konovsky,
2000; Colquitt, 2001; Colquitt et al., 2001).
Distributive justice refers to the fairness of outcomes (Homans, 1961; Adams,
1965; Deutsch, 1975). As an application of equity theory (Adams, 1965), for example,
people compare the effort they put into their work with the outcomes they receive, and
they also compare their efforts and outcomes to those of others. A fair outcome can also
be considered to be a new procedure - the outcome of a change to a remuneration
system can be a form of 360-degree feedback and a new disciplinary procedure could
include staff representation. It is interesting to note that people tend to view favourable
outcomes as fair and unfavourable outcomes as unfair (Adams, 1965; Brockner &
Wiesenfeld, 1996).
Procedural justice relates to perceptions of the fairness by which the decisions
are made that lead to the outcomes (Thibaut & Walker, 1975; Tyler & Lind, 1992).
Leventhal (1980) proposed that fair procedures are consistent, unbiased, correctable,
representative of all groups, ethical, and based on accurate information. Perceptions of
fairness are enhanced when employees are given information and ‘voice’ or
participation in decision-making (Bies & Shapiro, 1988; Konovsky, 2000; Tyler &
Lind, 1992; Connell & Waring, 2002; Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Meyer & Stensaker,
2006). ‘Voice’ is one of the means suggested by Tyler and Lind (1992) of developing
employees’ perceptions of procedural justice. Reasonable explanations or justifications
for a change develop perceptions of informational and interpersonal justice (Cobb et al.,
1995) and mitigate resistance to change (Lines, 2004).
Procedural justice was later differentiated from interactional justice (Bies &
Moag, 1986; Bies, 2001, 2005; Tyler & Bies, 1990), which is manifested in the ways in
which managers communicate both outcomes and procedures to staff (Novelli, Kirkman
& Shapiro, 1998). Interactional justice has been further sub-divided into interpersonal
justice (the politeness, respect and dignity with which people are treated) and
informational justice (the accuracy, fullness and timing of the information given
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(Greenberg, 1993; Colquitt, 2001; Colquitt, et al., 2001). Two of the respondents in
Bryant’s (2006, p. 252) study of change complained, “We were sort of kept in the dark
like mushrooms” and “I was told nothing. My work unit was told nothing.” Cobb et al.
(1995) indicate that the ‘accounts’ or explanations given for a change play a role in the
way in which people see fairness, including apologies when mistakes have been made
or expressions of regret when people suffer losses. Informational and interpersonal
justice can meld into each other. For example, Bryant’s (2006, p. 253) interviewees
reported that when they asked for explanations about the future of their jobs, managers
“either said they didn’t know or became abusive” and “would brush you off.”
The debate on the precise number of discrete types of organisational justice has
crystallised it into four main categories - distributive, procedural, interpersonal and
informational (Colquitt, 2001) - but various researchers still use the term interactional
justice instead of informational and interpersonal (e.g. Barclay, Skarlicki & Pugh, 2005;
Bernerth et al. 2007). A fifth type, systemic justice (Sheppard, Lewicki & Minton,
1992; Harlos & Pinder, 2000; Beugré & Baron, 2001), is an overarching term for the
perceived fairness of a wide variety of practices over time, and is a facet of the
organisational culture or sub-culture.
Positive outcomes of employee perceptions of justice include self-esteem (De
Cremer, 2003; Schroth & Shah, 2000), job satisfaction (McFarlin & Sweeney, 1992;
Van den Bos, Vermunt & Wilke, 1997), morale (Paterson & Cary, 2002), attendance
(De Boer, Bakker, Syroit & Schaufeli, 2002), commitment (Witt, Kacmar & Andrews,
2001; Fedor et al., 2006; Naumann, Benett, Bies & Martin, 1998), increased trust
(Brockner et al., 1997; Kernan & Hanges, 2002; Paterson & Cary, 2002; Ambrose &
Schminke, 2003), organisational citizenship behaviours (Wayne, Shore, Bomner &
Tetrick, 2002; Skarlicki & Latham, 1997; Niehoff & Moorman, 1993; Masterson et al.,
2000; Moorman, Blakely & Niehoff, 1998) and a related construct, taking charge
(Morrison & Phelps, 1999; Moon et al., 2008), co-operation (De Cremer & Van
Knippenberg, 2002), performance (Williams, 1999; Masterson et al., 2000), customer
service (Masterson, 2001) and, notably for this thesis, acceptance of change (Cobb et
al., 1995; Daly & Geyer, 1994; Paterson & Cary, 2002; Fedor et al., 2006; Masterson et
al., 2000).
Conversely, perceived injustice has been linked to cynicism (Bernerth et al.,
2007; Wanberg & Banas, 2000; Wanous et al., 2000), turnover (Daly & Geyer, 1994;
Fedor et al., 2006), conflict (Rahim, 2000), revenge and retaliation (Aquino, Tripp &
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Bies, 2001; Bies & Tripp, 2001; Folger & Skarlicki, 1999; Skarlicki, et al., 1999;
Barclay et al., 2005), violence (Bensimon, 1994), stress (Fox, Spector & Miles, 2001);
theft (Greenberg, 1990), counter-productive work behaviours (Fox et al., 2001), and
resistance to change (Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Paterson & Cary, 2002; Barclay et al.,
2005; Fedor et al., 2006; Bernerth et al., 2007).
Where change is considered unfair it will result in negative consequences. For
example, Bernerth et al. (2007) found in an empirical study that perceived distributive,
procedural and interactional justice combined to produce cynicism and lack of
commitment to change. In the context of a specific event, such as an organisational
change, employees may view developments against the backdrop of historical practices
including previous change initiatives. Unfair outcomes have been perceived in diverse
changes such as relocations (e.g. Daly & Geyer, 1994), mergers (Kiefer, 2002b; Fugate
et al., 2002; Schweiger & Denisi, 1996) or downsizing (Paterson & Cary, 2002;
Paterson & Härtel, 2002; Barclay et al., 2005). Fedor et al. (2006) found that employees
who believed they needed to shoulder a disproportionate burden in the process of
adaptation to change considered it unfair and Cobb et al. (1995) indicate that people
detect unfairness when executives get better rewards while employees lose out (see
Ward, 2006, for an example).
Brockner and Wiesenfeld (1996) found that employees tend to first focus on the
unfavourability of outcomes before judging that this is distributive injustice. They then
seek explanations for this negative situation by querying the procedures that caused it.
They concluded that perceptions of distributive injustice can be mitigated by
perceptions of procedural justice. Favourable outcomes tend not to produce the same
type of cognitive processes - when people get a favourable outcome they are pleased but
seldom query the procedures.
Perceptions of procedural, informational and interpersonal injustice are likely if
the procedures used to make changes are perceived as unfair, such as those based on
favouritism, if little information is given on the nature of the purpose of change and the
basis for the decision, and if the communication about the change is handled in an
insensitive manner. Procedural justice seems more focused on organisational
approaches whereas interpersonal justice is more strongly related to perceptions of the
behaviour of a particular leader (Barclay et al., 2005).
While perceptions of each form of justice have their own distinctive impact
(Paterson & Cary, 2002; Matheny & Smollan, 2005; Reb, Goldman, Kray &
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Cropanzano, 2006), Fairness Heuristic Theory (Lind, 2001; Van den Bos, et al., 1997)
suggests that although people can perceive both justice and injustice with respect to
various aspects of the event or issue, they tend to take a holistic view when making
overall fairness judgements. Van den Bos et al. (1997) found that when information was
provided early in the implementation of a decision it led to more positive perceptions of
organisational justice than if it was provided later. An empirical study by Beugré and
Baron (2001) included specific measures of systemic justice, for example, Overall
decisions in this company are fair, and The culture of this company encourages
fairness, and concluded that procedural and interactional justice serve as stronger
heuristics of systemic justice than distributive justice.
While perceptions of one form of justice can ameliorate perceptions of another
form of injustice (Brockner & Wiesenfeld, 1996), so too can one form of injustice
exacerbate another. Hughes (2000, p. 262) interviewed survivors of redundancy in an
organisation who perceived distributive injustice (reduced remuneration and status),
informational injustice (hearing of redundancies through the press first), and particularly
interpersonal injustice at the hands of a senior manager, for whom “overt expressions of
distress were perceived as self-pity” and whose remarks were viewed as “infuriating and
demoralizing”.
Perceptions of all forms of justice therefore need to be addressed in the context
of organisational change. Consider for example a case of downsizing, such as the one
described by Hughes (2000). Employees who are affected, either as victims or survivors
will require information about outcomes, such as who is to be made redundant and what
compensation and other forms of support will be provided to them (Brockner, 1992;
Cascio, 1993). They will be equally interested in what processes will be used in
determining numbers and the criteria for layoffs (Brockner, 1992; Ryan & Macky,
1998). Informational justice is therefore related to both distributive and procedural
justice. Similarly, sensitive treatment meted out to both victims and survivors would be
demonstrated in terms of both outcomes and processes (Brockner, 1992; Nauman et al.,
1998). Folger and Skarlicki (1998) discovered in an experimental design that the
termination interview was handled by managers as briefly as possible, which can be
construed as interpersonal and/or informational injustice. Barclay et al. (2005) indicate
that taking time to give information about downsizing is indicative of both. The role of
change managers who have to implement downsizing is seldom studied. Gandolfi
(2008, p. 297) found in a study of a bank downsizing that some managers “felt
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dishonest, anxious, upset, and uncomfortable when pursuing their executioners’
responsibilities.” Many were aware of the emotions of the victims but sought to distance
themselves physically and emotionally as a defence mechanism.
Perceptions of justice can lead to positive emotions, such as pride or happiness
(Weiss, Suckow & Cropanzano, 1999). Perceptions of injustice will lead to more
intense negative emotions. Homans (1961) and Adams (1965) both commented on
anger as an outcome of distributive injustice and Homans (1961) also noted guilt
occurring when people feel they have been unfairly advantaged.
Cropanzano et al. (2000) applied Lazarus’ (1991) cognitive appraisal theory to
procedural justice. They suggested that when people appraise an event as procedurally
unfair they first think about the consequences for themselves, then through secondary
appraisal, emotions arise, particularly when attributions are made about who was
responsible for the procedure and the outcome. They hypothesised that feelings of pride
occur when one obtains a favourable outcome despite an unfair procedure or guilt
because of it. Similarly, anger results from an unfavourable outcome delivered through
a procedure that favoured oneself, and sadness when one obtained an unfavourable
outcome, despite a procedure weighted in one’s favour. Two laboratory experiments
confirmed three of the four hypotheses but the researchers were puzzled when feelings
of pride occurred in one scenario but not in the other.
Referring to informational and interpersonal justice, Bies (2005, p. 100) believes
that “people possess a view of the self as ‘sacred’ and a violation of that sacred self is
personal and painful, resulting in an emotionally intense experience.” Respondents of
Bies and Tripp (2002) used words such as pain, hate, anger and rage as reactions to
injustice. Mikula, Scherer and Athenstaedt’s (1998) study of injustice across 37
countries found the most reported emotions to be anger and disgust, followed by
sadness, fear, guilt and shame. However, responses in this study were not necessarily
based on organisational triggers. In experiments testing the combined effects of
distributive, procedural and interactional justice, Stecher and Rosse (2005) found that
negative emotions correlated with distributive and interactional justice but not
procedural justice.
While a number of studies have explored the intersection of organisational
change and justice, change and emotions, and emotions and justice, only a few have
sought to investigate all three simultaneously. Downsizing has been the context in a
number of them. Armstrong-Stassen (1998) found survivors of downsizing experienced
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negative emotions related to distributive and procedural injustice, the latter including
informational injustice. Paterson and Härtel’s (2002) conceptual model of downsizing
proposes that perceptions of distributive, procedural and interactional injustice lead to
negative emotions in employees (victims and survivors). Paterson and Cary (2002)
surveyed survivors and victims of downsizing (with the latter given a considerable three
years notice) and found that although both groups experienced anxiety, perceptions of
distributive, procedural and interactional justice enhanced acceptance of change. One of
the interesting findings of Barclay et al.’s (2005) research study was that even if
personal outcomes were favourable, procedural and interactional injustice elicited high
levels of negative emotion (anger and hostility). Brennan and Skarlicki (2004) found a
complex pattern of results in the relationship between dispositional variables and
downsizing. Counter to predictions, survivors who were low on ‘angry hostility’ were
more prone to perceptions of interactional injustice, possibly because they were unused
to negative organisational outcomes and unfair treatment and therefore reacted more
strongly than expected to the stress of downsizing. Brotheridge’s (2003) survey of
people experiencing change found that perceptions of distributive and procedural
fairness reduced emotional exhaustion. Employees who participate in change processes
are more likely to show fewer negative emotions, increased trust in management, and
greater intentions to remain (Korsgaard, Sapienza & Schweiger, 2002; Brotheridge,
2003).
Matheny and Smollan (2005) surveyed masters’ students who had experienced
various forms of change and found significant correlations between emotions and
distributive, procedural, interpersonal and informational justice. Of note was the
observation that when people focus on the justice of change (particularly distributive
and interpersonal), negative emotions arise, but when the focus is on outcomes, there is
a stronger association with positive emotions. Qualitative studies on the three
interrelated constructs do not appear to have been done.
Changes to the psychological contract (Rousseau, 1995; Robinson & Rousseau,
1994; Turnley & Feldman, 1999) can also produce a sense of justice or injustice and
strong emotional reactions. The psychological contract, an employee perception of
mutual obligations of employer and employee, is a distinct construct to that of
organisational justice but there are considerable overlaps (Cropanzano & Prehar, 2001;
Korsgaard et al., 2002; Pate, Martin & McGoldrick, 2003; Tekleab, Takeuchi & Taylor,
2005). Breaches (which are inadvertent or beyond the control of management) and
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violations (which are seen as deliberate) lead to various negative behavioural responses,
such as intentions to quit, neglect and a decrease in Organisational Citizenship
Behaviours (Turnley & Feldman, 1999; Kickul et al., 2002). Violation leads to much
stronger negative emotions (Robinson & Rousseau, 1994; Conway & Briner, 2004) and
emotional exhaustion (Gakovic & Tetrick, 2003). Change to the psychological contract
can simply affect one individual in a micro change scenario (e.g. a promised promotion
or office move that was not actioned). Often it is an organisational change on a wider
level where employees, including managers, perceive that the balance of obligations
between employer and employee has been unfairly upset by management (Brooks &
Harfield, 2000; Lester & Kickul, 2001). A survey conducted by Kickul (2001) revealed
that employees who perceived that their organisations had not fulfilled obligations were
angry, frustrated, hostile and disappointed, particularly with regard to high levels of
procedural and interactional injustice.
In summary, all forms of justice, separately and in combination, can potentially
play a part in an employee’s beliefs and feelings about an organisational change. These
reactions will depend partly on how much they trust organisational leaders to act fairly.
This will be dealt with in detail in Research Question 11. People’s previous experience
of the fairness of change (see Research Question 7) also underpins their faith in the
fairness of an announced change (Brotheridge, 2003) and reduces cynicism. Where
people are engaged in the process of decision-making in a genuine way they feel they
are able to exert more control over the delivery of fair outcomes (Thibaut &Walker,
1975), and this element is often a key factor in reactions to change. It should also be
noted that while the injustice of a change can evoke negative emotions that undermine
the change, it is conceivable that the implementation of a current change could be
dogged by the negative emotions from what is perceived as an unfair (but unrelated)
issue or incident before or during the change.
Research Question 4a: How do perceptions of organisational justice mediate
cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 4b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
This section of the development of the model has looked at four factors within
the change itself. An employee at any level views the change through the mediating lens
of favourability of outcomes and its scale, temporal dimensions and fairness. These
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perceptions trigger emotional and behavioural responses. One set of factors that
moderate these cognitions, feelings and actions relates to how the employee perceives
aspects of the leaders, managers and consultants of change.
Variables within the Employee’s Perception of Change Leaders, Managers and Agents
that Moderate Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to Change
There are a number of variables that moderate cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses. Some of the moderators lie within the individual - emotional intelligence,
disposition, previous experience of change and change and stress outside the workplace.
Emotional Intelligence (EI)
An in-depth review of EI was provided in an earlier section, including an analysis of
how its different abilities can contribute to adaptation to organisational change. The two
main themes that emerged were the competition between models of EI (e.g. Mayer &
Salovey, 1997; Goleman, 1998; Bar-On, 1997) and the criticism that EI is not a
construct that offers anything different above existing knowledge of personality or
cognitive ability (e.g. Landy, 2005).
Different models of emotional intelligence have focused on EI as ability
(Salovey & Mayer, 1990; Mayer & Salovey, 1997) and on EI as a combination of
ability, disposition and other individual variables (Goleman, 1998; Bar-On, 1997;
Dulewicz & Higgs, 2000). Despite some perceived weaknesses (Davies et al. 1998;
Roberts et al., 2001; McEnrue & Groves, 2006), the weight of academic support for the
Mayer and Salovey ability model is overwhelming (e.g. Schutte et al., 1998; Ashkanasy
& Daus, 2005; Conte, 2005; Jordan, 2005; McEnrue & Groves, 2006). While the impact
of disposition will be addressed in more detail in the next research question, it should be
emphasised here that there has been considerable debate about the similarities and
differences between personality variables and EI. From conducting empirical studies
Law et al. (2004) and Vakola et al. (2004) concluded that personality and EI are distinct
but related concepts. Some researchers are nevertheless convinced that there is
considerable overlap between the constructs (Van Rooy & Viswesvaran, 2004; Van der
Zee & Verbeke, 2004). Another stream of research argues that trait EI is separate from
other personality variables and ability measures of EI, and empirical studies have tested
for similarities or differences between EI and dispositional measures (Petrides &
Furnham, 2003; Perez et al. 2005; Tett et al., 2005). Since EI and personality both
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contribute to reactions to organisational change I will focus on the ability EI variables in
this research question and leave discussion of disposition to the next research question.
Mayer and Salovey (1997) maintain that EI has four different levels or branches:
perception of appraisal and expression of emotion, emotional facilitation of thinking,
understanding and analysing emotions, employing emotional knowledge, reflective
regulation of emotions to promote emotional and intellectual growth. Given that there
are 16 abilities detailed in the model and four types of change player have been
identified, applying all of them to organisational change lies outside the scope of this
thesis. In the earlier part of the literature review and in a previous conference paper
(Smollan, 2006a) I explored how several of these abilities could help various change
players perceive, understand and manage emotions. In essence, during organisational
change employees who are high in EI are able to discern and control the feelings they
experience (Jordan, 2005; Paterson & Härtel, 2002). They will be aware of the potential
impact of their behaviour on their peers, subordinates and managers and moderate their
words and actions. They will also be cognisant of the emotional reactions of others to
change and respond appropriately. Cognitive processes help people make sense of the
change and their own emotional reactions (George & Jones, 2001; Scott-Ladd & Chan,
2004; Jordan, 2005; Clair & Dufresne, 2004), and the two promote or constrain change-
related behaviour.
The content and context of the change are always relevant factors (Holt et al.,
2007), and employees’ abilities to deal with a range of positive and negative outcomes
will be investigated. For example, Jordan et al. (2002a) propose that employees with
high EI are able to cognitively and affectively process issues pertaining to job
insecurity, and devise appropriate coping strategies. Paterson and Härtel’s (2002) model
indicates EI enables victims and survivors to cope with downsizing by developing
effective coping mechanisms. Clair and Dufresne (2004) and Gandolfi (2008) reveal
how managers of downsizing have to contend with the powerful negative emotions of
victims and simultaneously deal with their own emotions of guilt and anxiety. Effective
coping can be a combination of emotion-focused strategies (for example, distancing,
using positive self-talk about coping with change), and problem-focused strategies (such
as expressing concerns about the type or process of change being contemplated)
(Lazarus & Folkman, 1988; Hendry & Woodward, 2004; Clair & Dufresne, 2004;
Gandolfi, 2008). Studies of mergers (Kiefer, 2005; Fugate et al., 2001) provide evidence
of winners and losers and EI helps employees label, understand and deal with the
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positive and negative emotions that arise. Cunningham (2006) found that affective
commitment to a change helped people cope with change. Yet people high in EI should
be able to regulate the negative affective commitment they may feel. Vakola et al.
(2004) reported that EI was correlated with positive responses to organisational change.
It should be emphasised again that there are few quantitative studies of the
impact of EI on organisational change and apparently no qualitative studies. Therefore,
the present study should provide a rich vein of information worth mining.
Research Question 5: How does employee emotional intelligence moderate
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change?
Disposition
It is commonly believed by lay people that the way in which employees respond to
organisational change is directly related to disposition (Wanous et al., 2000; Bareil et
al., 2007) and a plethora of labels has been presented to capture these traits. Watson and
Clark (1997) specifically identified a predilection for change in various facets of life as
representative of people with high positive affectivity, a characteristic which will also
be found in organisational contexts (Spector & Fox, 2002).
Emotion words are often used to describe aspects of one’s personality, such as
gloomy, resentful and calm (Plutchik, 1994). In an earlier section in this literature
review the intersecting constructs of mood and personality were discussed. The
circumplex models of Russell and Feldman Barrett (1999), Watson et al. (1988) and
Larsen et al. (2002), presented in Figure 1, deal with trait and state mood. In particular,
Watson et al. have considered positive and negative affectivity to be dispositional
characteristics.
Researchers have used three related concepts, sometimes interchangeably:
personality, temperament and disposition (Hofstee, 1994). Personality is considered to
be “the most important ways in which people differ in their enduring emotional,
interpersonal, experiential and motivational styles” (McRae & John, 1992, p. 175).
Temperament is regarded as having a stronger biological basis and therefore less
amenable to change (Bates, 2000; Eliasz, 1990). Dispositions, according to House et
al., 1996, p. 205) are: psychological, as opposed to physical or other objectively assessed characteristics of
individuals - personality characteristics, need states, attitudes, preferences and motives…
Dispositions are generally viewed as tendencies to respond to situations, or classes of
situations, in a particularly predetermined manner…
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The concept of trait emotional intelligence, referred to in the previous research
question, identifies a number of personality characteristics such as optimism, self-
efficacy, assertiveness and flexibility (Bar-On, 1997; Goleman, 1998; Van der Zee &
Wabeke, 2004). One overlap between trait and ability models of EI is in the concept of
empathy (Rogers, 1975; Lazarus, 1999; Humphrey, 2002). Change leaders and
managers who are high in empathy will better anticipate how staff will react to change
on cognitive, behavioural, and importantly, affective levels, and be able to address these
reactions. Colleagues with empathy are also able to provide support.
Whereas Cattell (1956) identified 16 separate traits, Eysenck (1991) listed three
superordinate traits - extraversion, neuroticism and psychoticism - with all others
subsumed under one of these headings. The most widely used model of personality is
the Five Factor model, also known as the Big Five, which maintains that all traits can be
categorised into one of the five factors (Digman, 1990; McCrae & Costa, 1987; McCrae
& John, 1992). This has been well supported in the empirical literature, including
studies in the organisational domain (e.g. Vakola et al., 2004; Van Rooy &
Wisvesveran, 2004; Van der Zee & Wabeke, 2004; Barrick & Mount, 1991; Moy &
Lam, 2004).
Each of the five items can be used to explore patterns of behaviour with respect
to organisational change. The first, openness to experience, is a concept that virtually
defines adaptation to change. The second, extraversion, allows people to make their
views of change known and possibly gain useful influence. The third and fourth,
agreeableness and conscientiousness, indicate that people will likely demonstrate
goodwill in accepting change and perform at their best in making it successful. People
with the last trait, neuroticism, are likely to experience anxiety and stress over change.
The Big Five model has been tested empirically in the context of change by
Vakola et al. (2004), who found positive correlations between acceptance of change and
extraversion, openness to experience, conscientiousness and agreeableness, and a
negative relationship with neuroticism. Brennan and Skarlicki (2004) found that two
factors in particular, conscientiousness and agreeableness, the latter conceptualised
more specifically as ‘angry hostility’, to be contributing factors to the way survivors of
downsizing continued to perform. Moon et al. (2008) found in two studies that
conscientiousness predicted ‘taking charge’ (Morrison & Phelps, 1999), which is
partially concerned with initiating change.
While proponents of the Big Five model explicitly state that it contains all
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personality characteristics (e.g. Digman, 1990; McCrae & John, 1992; Barrick &
Mount, 1991), a number of empirical studies have focused on discrete dispositional
factors. In developing and testing a scale to measure dispositional reactions to change,
Oreg (2003) found four major relevant personality factors: need for routine, emotional
responsiveness, short-term focus on outcomes, and cognitive rigidity. In a number of
empirical studies he found that disposition predicted reaction to change, regardless of
context. Testing a later model he found disposition (as well as a range of contextual
factors) to be an antecedent of cognitive, affective and behavioural resistance to change
(Oreg, 2006). Kruglanski et al. (2007) demonstrated that the need for closure and a
predilection for locomotion (a propensity for action) are additional personality traits that
influence ability to cope with change. Resilience (Wanberg & Banas, 2000) and
hardiness (Cole et al., 2006) are traits that help people deal with difficult situations
arising from change or recover from them.
In a study of managers Judge et al. (1999) found seven personality factors
predicted reactions to change, which they grouped into two main categories. Positive
self-concept included locus of control (Rotter, 1980), self-efficacy (Bandura, 1977),
self-esteem and positive affectivity, while risk tolerance included openness to
experience, tolerance of ambiguity and risk aversion. In particular, tolerance for
ambiguity and positive affectivity were strongly correlated with self-reported ability to
deal with change. Wanberg and Banas (2000) revealed that self-esteem, optimism and
perceived control were related to acceptance of change. A number of researchers have
reported self-efficacy, and more specifically change self-efficacy, to be a significant
variable in determining responses to organisational change (Jimmieson et al., 2004;
Herold, et al., 2007; Holt et al., 2007). Lau and Woodman (1995) found a significant
relationship between locus of control on the formation of change schemata but little
impact of dogmatism. Rudisill and Edwards (2002) note that self-efficacy and locus of
control play a part in determining how employees react to being laid off, but maintain
that limited research has been done. Locus of control with respect to a specific change
has also been researched by Chen and Wang (2006). They reported that people with a
high internal locus of control believe they can exert some influence over change and
therefore can cope with it better. Using Herscovitch and Meyer’s (2002) model of
commitment to change, they found that high internals commit to a change because they
believe in the change or think they should support it. High externals do so because of
the costs of failing to comply. Chen and Wang (2006) accept that under certain
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conditions high internals will resist change, for example, if they are unable to influence
a change which brings negative consequences. Of all the traits mentioned, two in
particular, locus of control and change self-efficacy, appear most frequently in the
above literature sources.
Of particular relevance is the literature on dispositional cynicism, which was
referred to earlier in the literature review (e.g. Wanberg & Banas, 2000; Wanous et al.,
2000), since it “results in anger, bitterness, resentment and manipulation” (Abraham,
2000, p. 271) - and resistance to organisational change (Stanley et al., 2005, Abraham,
2000; Reichers, Wanous & Austin, 1997; Wanous et al., 2000).
It should be emphasised that while personality can play a key role in adaptation
to change, other variables may be more influential for some people, or some types of
change. For example a person who is high in neuroticism, and therefore possibly
predisposed against change, is likely to react positively to an organisational change that
lowers stress levels. Similarly, even those who show significant levels of
agreeableness, conscientiousness and openness to experience will probably resist a
change that is clearly unfavourable and unjust (Chawla & Kelloway, 2004; Bareil et al.,
2007). In one recent study Bareil et al. (2007) found dispositional discomfort with
change to be dominant factor in 23 per cent of their sample with the balance primarily
affected by situational factors, such as espoused reasons for change and perceived
impact on workload, organisational effectiveness and customers. Kruglanski et al.
(2007) found that organisational climate, specifically one geared to change, also played
a significant role. Oreg (2006) reported a range of non-dispositional variables within the
individual and organisation that contributed to responses to change.
The focus of employee disposition has been on recipients or managers of
change. When people initiate change themselves they will naturally be supportive of it
since they have ‘psychological ownership’ of the change (Dirks et al., 1996). Thus even
if people have a predilection to avoid or resist change, they may think, feel and behave
differently when they conceive of and lead a change. According to Caldwell (2003)
change leaders are high in creativity, integrity, risk taking, adaptability and openness to
new ideas. On the emotional front they tend to be excited, enthusiastic, passionate and
hopeful about the change they are leading, but need to address the frustration, anxiety
and disappointment that may accompany various stages (Huy, 2002; Day, 2004).
Regardless of the role one has in an organisational change, the key issue is how
personality characteristics combine with other individual differences and situational
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factors to produce reactions to change. Given that personality is a relatively stable
pattern of behaviour (Digman, 1990), to what extent can it be influenced by
environmental factors such as the employee’s previous experience of change?
Research Question 6: How does employee disposition moderate cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses to change?
Previous Experience of Change
Frequency of change was identified in Research Question 3 as a possible source of
negative perceptions since it can place demands on a person’s coping resources (Huy,
2002; Kiefer, 2005; Woodward & Hendry, 2004). People make sense of change by
reviewing past experience (Cameron, 2006). This forms part of the schema of change
they have developed, and serves as a frame of reference for interpreting the change at
hand (George & Jones, 2001). For example, Lau and Woodman (1995) found that one
negative outcome of change was a belief that organisational change leads to more work.
The term restructuring may be synonymous with downsizing to some people.
Previous experience of change has the potential of producing two opposing
responses to a newly announced change. An employee who has previously experienced
a positive change, or who has coped well with a negative change, may respond
positively (Meyer & Stensaker, 2006), particularly if they have the dispositional
qualities of change resilience, self-efficacy and locus of control (Cole et al., 2007;
Jimmieson et al., 2004; Holt et al., 2007). Clair and Dufresne (2004) and Gandolfi
(2008) reported that some managers of downsizing regarded themselves as veterans of
the process and had developed effective coping mechanisms, such as distancing and
simply getting on with the job, distasteful as it was. On the other hand, employees with
negative experiences might view the upcoming change with unease. Perceived
organisational support also plays a role. Self et al. (2007) reported on an organisation
that had experienced one major downsizing per year over a decade and found that
people found it easier to adapt when there was good communication, good relationships
with leaders and a supportive environment. Research by Collerette et al. (2006) revealed
that a poorly managed change was recalled by staff more than a decade later. The
assumption of these researchers, that regular change may predispose people to cope
with a new change, was not borne out in their study of the introduction of a new
technology. This lends weight to the view that the context of the change, the outcome of
the change, the process of change, the effort required for successful adaptation, and
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disposition all contribute (together with the other factors referred in my model) to a
person’s cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to an added change.
The quaint acronym, the BOHICA Syndrome, ‘bend over, here it comes again’,
was referred to by participants in Connell and Waring’s (2002) longitudinal study of
organisational change. Kan and Parry (2004, p. 469) quote from an internal report of
one organisation that staff were “bruised from the changes in the past.” Past failures in
organisational change breed cynicism, which, according to Wanous et al. (2000),
becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. In this context the employees are pessimistic about
outcomes (Connell & Waring, 2002), attribute blame to management (Wanous et al.,
2000), and their lack of commitment can undermine the changes (Abraham, 2000;
Connell & Waring, 2002). However, Stanley et al. (2005) found that cynicism about a
specific organisational change to be a better predictor of resistance than a more general
organisational change cynicism. It should also be noted that even if previous initiatives
have been successful, frequent changes will trigger negative reactions as they place
severe demands on people’s ability to cope (Kiefer, 2005; Rahe et al., 2000).
Research Question 7: How do employees’ previous experiences of change
moderate cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change?
Change and Stress outside the Workplace
An organisational change impacts on one part of an employee’s life. The manner in
which an employee reacts to the change depends on the broader context of his/her life.
The Holmes-Rahe Social Readjustment Rating scale (Holmes-Rahe 1967), and other
instruments that followed, have over the years demonstrated high correlations between
recent life changes and negative physical and psychological symptoms (Rahe et al.,
2000). Research into stress and family-work balance indicates the difficulty of
separating emotional reactions to factors outside of work from those generated at work
(Wharton & Erickson, 1993; Harris, 2002; Montgomery, Panagopolou, de Wildt &
Meenks, 2006). Brotheridge and Lee (2005) and Haar (2006) point to the consequences
of family issues interfering with work issues, and found that home stress to some extent
predicts job-related stress.
An individual faced with a major change outside of work, or a number of minor
changes, or any stress-creating factor, may react negatively - on cognitive, affective and
behavioural levels - to an organisational change that by itself may not have evoked any
negative reactions. Any stress-inducing issue outside of work can trigger negative
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responses to change at work, as employees’ coping resources are depleted (Lawrence,
2006). Latack (1986) suggests that people who face stress outside of work are likely to
use escape rather than control strategies when dealing with stress at work. In Woodward
and Hendry’s (2004) survey of organisational change 86 per cent of respondents
reported that deliberately separating work from home helped them cope. Employee
disposition is a related factor - those with higher resilience are better able to cope with
additional demands (Wanberg & Banas, 2000).
The culture of the organisation can make an impact on both the experience and
expression of emotion, both at work and outside of it. A study of The Body Shop
(Martin et al., 1998) revealed an organisation where emotional expressiveness was
considered normal - whether it related to issues inside or outside the workplace.
Bacharach et al. (1996) reported that airline employees’ abilities to deal with
organisational change were affected by conditions peculiar to that industry, such as shift
work and being away from home for several days at a time. Changes in non-work
relationships were the outcomes of work changes and coping with both work and non-
work demands affected employee wellbeing. However, there appears to be little other
literature on how changes, or other potentially stress-inducing events or issues from
outside the work environment, affect an employee’s cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses to an organisational change.
Research Question 8: In what ways are employees’ cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to organisational change moderated by changes and any
stress-producing event outside of work?
Four factors that relate to individual attributes and circumstances have been presented
that moderate how an employee responds to change on a cognitive, affective and
behavioural level. The next group of factors deals with how the employee perceives
elements of the change leaders, mangers and agents.
Variables within the Employee’s Perception of Change Leaders, Managers and Agents
that Moderate Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to Change
Three potentially overlapping variables will be discussed in this section: employee
perceptions of the leader’s ability, emotional intelligence (EI) and trustworthiness. Two
or more levels of management may be involved in leading and managing organisational
change, including an employee’s immediate supervisor, and various change agents may
also be involved. Even those leading and managing change often have senior executives
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or board members whom they report to, and their views of the roles these people play
can be relevant to the way they deal with the change. The perceptions of an employee of
the actions of these stakeholders will produce different evaluations and different
emotional and behavioural reactions, but the more personal relationship between
employee and manager might be the most influential. Another possibility is that people
make blanket judgements of those above them. Since Lind (2001) proposes that people
use a heuristic approach in developing an overall perception of organisational justice, it
is plausible that they do the same when assessing the abilities and qualities of those
designing and implementing change.
The overlapping nature of the three constructs can be confusing, especially since
all have been viewed by various authors as a combination of ability and personality. It is
therefore important to signal that in Research Question 9 the emphasis is on the
perceived abilities of change leaders, managers and agents to lead and manage change;
in Research Question 10 the focus is on leader EI and in Research Question 11 the
emphasis is on perceived trustworthiness in the form of the dispositional quality of
integrity. Two of the topics, leadership and EI, have been analysed in some depth
elsewhere in the literature and the main points will be summarised in Research
Questions 9 and 10.
Perceived Leadership Ability of Change Leaders, Managers and Agents
The relationship between leadership, emotion and change was highlighted earlier in the
literature review on the nature of change players (e.g. Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Kotter &
Cohen, 2004; Conger & Kanungo, 1998). There are multiple definitions of leadership
(see Yukl, 2006, for an overview) which is essentially a process of influencing others to
achieve common objectives, although it is often driven by the determination of the
leaders to achieve their own objectives (Grint, 2005; Buchanan & Badham, 2008).
Leadership has been considered to involve the exercise of power and influence through
a variety of means, such as by control of resources, the application of reward and
punishment mechanisms, or the use of authority, expertise or charisma (French &
Raven, 1962). It has been thought by some to be different to management in that
leadership is about creating change while management is about maintaining stability
(Kotter, 1996; Bennis & Nanus, 1985; Kan & Parry, 2004).
Staff who are facing change assess the ability of leaders to manage the various
aspects of their roles, and specifically their ability to lead and implement change. Tubbs
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and Schulz (2005) developed a taxonomy of leadership abilities, two of which relate to
innovation and change. Higgs and Rowland (2002) list eight clusters of change
management competencies that include abilities in initiation, leadership, facilitation and
execution. Caldwell (2003) separated change leadership competencies (such as the
ability to inspire a vision) from change management competencies (including
empowering others and managing resistance) but admitted there was an overlap. Trait
theories of leadership identify personality as a central feature of the power that is vested
in leaders (Grint, 2005).
Leadership has also been researched within a social constructionist paradigm.
Meindl (1995) maintains that the true nature of a leader’s personality should not be the
most important aspect. Rather it is the way in which the leader’s personality has been
constructed by the followers, through personal experience and multiple discourses,
which should be the main line of investigation. Charismatic leadership is a phenomenon
not merely of the leader and individual follower but also of collective followership, and
has a strong element of emotional contagion to it (Wasielewski, 1985). Grint (2005, p.
1492) suggests that since followers often construct reality, and problems associated with
it, in different ways to leaders, relationships between leaders and followers involve
“competition between different accounts, between different interests and between
different decision-makers.”
Two major types of leadership have been strongly associated with organisational
change, transformational leadership and charismatic leadership, and both to some extent
involve the use of emotion (Yukl, 1999; Wasielewski, 1985; Bono & Ilies, 2006;
Humphrey, 2002; Johnson, 2008). Transformational leadership aims to influence
followers through idealised influence (charisma), inspirational motivation, intellectual
stimulation and individualised consideration (Bass, 1999). Empirical studies have
demonstrated the relationship between transformational leadership and adaptation to
different types of organisational change (Kan & Parry, 2004; Eyal & Kark, 2004;
Bommer et al., 2005; Nemanich & Keller, 2007; Wu, Neubert & Yi, 2007). The nature
of the external environment often plays an important role. Hmieleski and Ensley (2007),
for example, demonstrated in their study of start ups that transformational leadership is
particularly effective in less stable contexts. Charisma is one element of
transformational leadership and the literature on the more narrowly focused construct of
charismatic leadership has explored its conceptual basis (Wasielewski, 1985; Fiol,
Harris & House, 1999) and empirically demonstrated its effects on follower
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performance (Conger et al., 2000). However, there is little empirical evidence (outside
of the transformational leadership literature) of its impact on organisational change.
While there are many other types of leadership, successful change managers
have to adopt styles that engage followers (Huy, 2001). One style in particular - the
participative - has contributed to perceptions of procedural justice (Thibaut & Walker,
1975; Tyler & Lind, 1992; De Cremer, 2003, Van den Bos, et al., 1997; Lines, 2004)
and trustworthiness (Tyler & Lind, 1992; Lines, 2004). It has also been considered a
means of obtaining commitment of followers and overcoming resistance to change
(Coch & French, 1948; Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Chawla & Kelloway, 2004; Lines,
2004; Scott-Ladd & Chan, 2004; Meyer & Stensaker, 2006; Handy, 1985; Covey, 1991;
Schein, 2004). Senge (1990, p. 217) puts it simply, “Involvement is the key to
implementing change and increasing commitment. We tend to be more interested in our
own ideas than in those of others. If we are not involved we are likely to resist change.”
Harris (2004) documents how a change in leadership style from autocratic to
participative helped one school principal to overcome teachers’ resistance to change.
Szabla (2007) found that leaders who used normative-reeducative styles (involving
participation) and those who used rational approaches produced more positive thoughts,
feelings and intentions towards change than leaders who used power-coercive tactics.
However, it has also been pointed out that participation can delay implementation of
change and create resistance if the time required cuts excessively into daily routines
(Meyer & Stensaker, 2006).
A key task of leadership is communication. To gain commitment to change
leaders need to explain what change will take place, why, when, where, how and who is
affected (Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Klein, 1996). The value of management
communication about organisational change has been shown empirically by Nelissen
and Van Selm (2008); Kramer, Dougherty and Pierce (2004) and Daly, Teague and
Kitchen (2003). Informing staff about processes and outcomes are both important and
Van den Bos et al. (2003) demonstrated that where process information is given first,
people are more likely to perceive fairness. Communication also involves the
willingness to listen to other points of view and confirms the importance of participation
and consultation. Leader-Member Exchange Theory indicates that leaders choose
followers with whom they identify more closely as members of an in-group and engage
in closer forms of communication that can be seen as unfair by those in the out-group
(Scandura, 1999).
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Change leaders, managers and agents may themselves experience change as
emotional. Not only do they need to understand their own emotions, they also need to
inject emotion into driving change and anticipate and respond to the emotional reactions
of others (Fox & Amichai-Hamburger, 2001). Emotional intelligence has been
empirically shown to correlate with transformational leadership, including its
charismatic elements (e.g. Barling et al., 2000; Mandell & Pherwani, 2003), and will be
dealt with in the next research question.
Research Question 9: How are employees’ cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses to change moderated by the perceived leadership ability of the change
leaders, managers and agents?
Perceived Emotional Intelligence (EI) of Change Leaders, Managers and Agents
The value of EI abilities of change leaders to manage the emotional aspects of change
was outlined in detail in an earlier section (Jordan, 2005; Scott-Ladd & Chan, 2004;
Chrusciel, 2006), as was the relationship between EI and transformational leadership
(e.g. Ashkanasy & Tse, 2000; Mandell & Perwani, 2003; Barling et al., 2000; Gardner
& Stough, 2002; Palmer et al., 2000; Wong & Law, 2002).
Firstly, change leaders, managers and agents need to inject emotion into
communicating the need for change, both positive and negative where relevant. This
helps create a shared vision (Jordan, 2005), although this may not always be likely, such
as in a redundancy process. Hope and excitement are needed for positive developments,
such as the introduction of a new product line, sadness and regret for negative
developments, such as downsizing or closing of branches, and anxiety to reduce
dangerous complacency (Kotter, 1996; Huy, 2002). Yet emotional expression needs to
be perceived as authentic by followers or they will react with cynicism (Ferres &
Connell; 2004; Fox & Amichai-Hamburger, 2001; Stanley et al., 2005).
Secondly, people leading and managing change need to be seen as adept in
discerning their followers’ emotional reactions (Caruso, Mayer & Salovey 2002;
Chrusciel, 2006) and providing the necessary support. Employees who perceive helpful
responses from their managers, and emotional capability (Huy, 1999) and wider support
from their organisations (Naumann et al., 1998; Masterson et al., 1998), will remain
more loyal, productive and committed to the change than if they encounter
inappropriate responses or neglect. Ozcelik, Langton and Aldrich (2008) found that
leaders who create a positive emotional climate are able to produce good outcomes for
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their organisations, for example, in terms of increased revenue and market penetration.
Sanchez-Burk and Huy (2008) use a photographic metaphor, aperture, to indicate that
change leaders and managers need to focus simultaneously on group emotions and
individual emotions. Positive and negative emotional contagion (Bartel & Saavedra,
2000) influence responses to change and a dual orientation to groups and individuals is
necessary.
Thirdly, change leaders need to be able to control their own emotions, such as
fear, anger and frustration, and efficiently manage the ‘technical’ aspects of the change
programme, and their jobs in general, so that they do not lose the respect of their
followers. This is particularly helpful when change requires conflict resolution skills
(Jordan & Troth, 2002).
It should be noted that followers who are high in EI should be more alert to the
EI of their leaders. On the one hand this could make them more appreciative of their
leaders’ words and actions, but on the other hand, it could make them somewhat more
demanding in their expectations than those of followers with lower EI. It could similarly
be argued that followers who are more cynical may perceive leaders’ responses to them
as weak or self-serving.
Research Question 10: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
of employees to change moderated by the perceived emotional intelligence of the
change leaders, managers and agents?
Perceived Trustworthiness of Change Leaders, Managers and Agents
Perceptions of the trustworthiness of those designing and implementing change will
influence employees’ responses to change (Oreg, 2006). Trust has been conceptualised
as one person’s belief in the sincerity, benevolence or truthfulness of another (Gurtman,
1992) and in his/her integrity, competence, consistency/fairness and openness (Clark &
Payne, 1997). Since Research Question 9 dealt with perceptions of leader ability, this
section will focus on employee perceptions of the integrity and benevolence of their
change managers and leaders. Some organisational theorists have separated trust in
one’s manager from trust in other staff and trust in the organisation itself (Hubbell &
Chory-Assad, 2005). People undergoing organisational change will focus on the
trustworthiness of various layers of management and this could produce meaningful
differences in their reactions to the change.
Trust has dispositional, relational and contextual antecedents. Dispositional trust
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has been related to cynicism and has extremes of gullibility and hostility (Gurtman,
1992). Trust in others also depends on their conduct over time, and while it is not easy
to gain another’s trust, it only takes one action or conversation to violate it. Repairing
damaged trust takes time. Context also may be important. For example, an employee
perceives that his/her boss has acted dishonestly or has withheld information, but may
have been coerced into doing so by more senior management (Gandolfi, 2008).
Trust has cognitive, affective and behavioural components (Clark & Payne,
1997). McAllister (1995) found that cognitive-based interpersonal trust in organisations
predicted emotion-based trust, and that there were separate antecedents and
consequences. A review of literature by Young and Daniel (2003) reveals the extent to
which trust has an emotional basis. Their model identifies the emotions (or affect-laden
terms) associated with three aspects of relationships. Relationship-building emotions
include interest, admiration, respect and liking; relationship-sustaining emotions are
affection, gratitude, security, confidence and acceptance; relationship enjoying emotions
consist of appreciation, contentment and satisfaction. These emotions, together with
cognitive elements, constitute interpersonal trust. The terms used by Erlangovan and
Shapiro (1998), betrayal and violation, have strong affective undertones. Dunn and
Schweitzer (2005) conducted a sequence of experiments which revealed, unsurprisingly,
that positive emotions led to trust and negative emotions undermined it. They suggest
that to enhance perceptions of their own trustworthiness, people need to adapt their
behaviour to respond to the emotions of others. This signals the importance of
emotional intelligence in developing relationships of trust. Dunn and Schweitzer (2005)
observed that people who were aware of their emotions were less likely to let them
affect their trust judgements, lending weight to the concept that while one aspect of
emotional intelligence allows affect to facilitate thinking, another prevents affect from
undermining that thinking (Mayer & Salovey, 1997).
Trustworthiness is a characteristic of effective leadership. Parry and Proctor-
Thompson (2002) discovered that integrity contributes strongly to transformational
leadership ability, while Conger et al. (2000) found a similar relationship with
charismatic leadership. Druskat and Pescosolido (2005) studied emergent leadership in
self-managing work teams and found that emotional competence, particularly the ability
to develop interpersonal understanding, increased the perceived trustworthiness of the
leaders. Whereas trust has often been researched as a dyadic relationship, Shamir and
Lapidot (2003) have shown that notions of trust are often socially constructed by
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conversations in groups.
Organisational change is often accompanied by anxiety as to how the change is
going to impact on organisational, group and individual levels. A number of empirical
studies have shown that employee trust in management’s integrity should heighten
acceptance of change, or minimise resistance. In a large survey of employees, Morgan
and Zeffane (2005) specifically identified structural reorganisation as a major cause of
declining trust in management. Kiefer’s (2005) study of a merger of companies revealed
that decreased trust was strongly predicted by negative emotions. The study by Young
and Daniel (2003) revealed the concern of management that lack of trust was a source
of resistance to change. Harris (2004) found that teachers distrusted both the ability of
other staff to adapt to a change initiative and the benevolence of the principal, who had
been seen to introduce change without consultation and without consideration of the
views or feelings of the teachers. George and Zhou (2007) found that trust in
supervisors, allied to interactional justice, enhanced creativity. Ferres, Connell and
Travaglione (2005) researched trust among staff who were redeployed when one
hospital closed and they were moved to another. They found that levels of trust in
management declined in staff who were redeployed and those who were not. This
supports the suggestion made in Research Question 1 that people facing change may
consider both their own outcomes and those of others. The authors contend that non-
deployed employees not only empathised with their colleagues but also viewed their
own future positions with some unease. Curiously, they found that the emotional
commitment of the redeployed employees to be higher than that of the others and
speculated that it might have been related to perceived higher levels of transformational
leadership. However, the people in the redeployed group reported higher levels of
turnover intention.
It was noted in the section on organisational justice that perceptions of fairness
enhance acceptance of organisational change. Leventhal (1980) and Tyler and Lind
(1992) noted trust to be a significant factor in the formation of employee perceptions of
procedural justice and that this impacts directly on their choice of behaviour. Brockner
et al. (1997) demonstrated empirically that employees’ trust in managers derives from
perceptions of procedural justice and has a significant impact on their acceptance of
changes, particularly when the outcomes are unfavourable. This link was confirmed by
Paterson and Cary (2002) in a study on downsizing. Mishra and Spreitzer (1998)
propose that if survivors of downsizing do not trust management they will withdraw or
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retaliate. Chawla and Kelloway (2004) found trust to be related to procedural and
informational justice during a merger. Lind (2001), in particular, suggests that fairness
can serve as heuristic for interpersonal trust.
Fairholm and Fairholm (2002) believe that one of the roles of leadership is to
develop a culture of trust and that followers are more inclined to trust their leaders if
they do not seem to be acting out of self-interest. Their observations, that leader
sensitivity to the needs of followers and keeping promises result in trust, highlight the
importance of both emotional intelligence and fulfilling psychological contracts, an
employee’s belief of reciprocal obligations (Rousseau, 1989). In the context of
organisational change people need to be able to trust their leaders and breaches and
violations of the psychological contract are considered to have negative impact on
relational trust (Robinson, 1996; Robinson & Rousseau, 1994; Ferres et al., 2005).
While trust in a leader may have been high in previous situations, it can be damaged by
events in another context, such as an organisational change.
Research Question 11: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
to change moderated by the perceived trustworthiness of the change leaders,
managers and agents?
This section of the development of the model has looked at how three factors within the
employee perceptions of change leaders, managers and agents moderate cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses to the change. The final set of moderators lies in
factors pertaining to the organisation itself, that is, its culture, and other internal and
external issues.
Variables within the Employee’s Perception of the Organisation that Moderate
Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to Change
Perceived Organisational Culture
Several constructs relating organisational culture to organisational change and emotions
have already been identified elsewhere in this literature review, for example, emotional
labour (Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006; Turnbull, 2002), systemic justice (Beugré &
Baron, 2001), leadership (Harris, 2004), trust in management (Fairholm & Fairholm,
2000), changes to the psychological contract (Robinson & Rousseau, 1999), temporal
dimensions of change (Huy, 2002) and perceived organisational support (Masterson et
al., 2000).
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Organisational culture is a set of assumptions, beliefs, values, customs,
structures, norms, rules and traditions (Schein, 2004), and a system of shared meanings
(Pizer & Härtel, 2005). How much is really shared is nevertheless debatable (Martin,
2002). Culture is what a group learns over a period of time as that group solves its problems of
survival in an external environment and its problems of internal integration. Such learning
is simultaneously a behavioral, cognitive, and an emotional process (Schein, 1990, p. 111).
Researchers have taken the position that organisational culture is socially
constructed (Gabriel, 1998; Zembylas, 2006). Stated corporate values are often found in
websites and other organisational material and are drilled into people through a variety
of communication mechanisms, such as induction, other forms of training and
performance management systems. Yet practice is not always aligned with the rhetoric
as Helms Mills (2005) found in her study on gender, culture and change.
In the context of this thesis culture and change intersect in various ways: when
the culture contains a strong focus on innovation and adaptability, when the culture
itself is the target of change, and when the culture changes as a result of strategic,
tactical or operational changes. The emotional aspects of the organisation’s culture,
variously called affective culture (Barsade & Gibson, 2007), emotional culture
(Zembylas, 2006) and affective climate (Tse, Dasborough & Ashkanasy, 2008),
influence how emotion is experienced and expressed when change takes place.
Orientation to change is one characteristic of organisational culture. Senge’s
(1992) learning organisations have been considered by Jordan (2005), Holt et al. (2007)
and Scott-Ladd and Chan (2004) to have a positive orientation to change. An
organisation where innovation or speedy responses to change are major drivers will
encounter different individual responses to one that is more bureaucratic and less agile
(Lines, 2004). One company that could be judged in the former category is Vodafone.
When its New Zealand subsidiary acquired an internet service provider to enter a new
market, its work culture was reported as being “energised”. According to a senior
manager the company’s culture was “youthful, casual and fun” and that “it was
important for workers to have energy and passion” to be competitive (Keown, 2006, p.
C4). Similarly, Google’s “anything-goes spirit” and “off the wall culture” at its
California headquarters signalled to a Fortune journalist that the company had
successfully embraced a change-oriented philosophy (Lashinsky, 2006, pp. 45, 46). In a
recent interview in Time magazine (Making P & G new and improved, 2008), the CEO
of Proctor and Gamble indicated that the company needed to transform itself into an
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innovative organisation where the values of openness, connectedness, curiosity, courage
and collaboration became embedded in the culture. Starwood Hotels’ “culture of
creativity” allowed for the implementation of an efficiency tool, Six Sigma, which was
considered a “surprising move given Six Sigma’s rap as a creativity killer” (Ante, 2007,
p. 88). A stream of innovative ideas followed. Conversely a Wal-Mart executive who
was dismissed and took legal action against the company claimed in an interview with a
BusinessWeek journalist that the company “would rather have had a painkiller [than]
taken the vitamin of change” (Berner, 2007, p. 71). According to the journalist, the
executive “paints a picture of warring fiefdoms and a passive-defensive culture that was
hostile to outsiders” (p. 71). In referring to a meeting at General Motors in 2005 to
discuss the development of an electric car Welch (2008, p. 38) used three words to
characterise the culture of the company, which neatly correspond with cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses to change - “Myopia. Fear. Inertia.” By mid-2008
the financial position of the company had finally forced a change in direction.
Huy (2005) suggests that strategic change, which is usually radical in nature,
challenges a sense of core identity, which is focused on organisational values, and that
anxiety and defensiveness are used to meet this challenge. Changes that are seen to be
compatible with an organisation’s culture will be more readily accepted (Lines, 2004).
Individual loss of identity during change was referred to earlier as a source of resistance
(e.g. Dirks, et al., 1996). Cultural change often results in power balances shifting and
those individuals or group members who perceive they have lost power may resist the
change (Wolfram Cox, 1997). The ways in which individuals interpret organisational
events, including change events, depends to a large extent on their previous history with
the organisation, and their perception of the organisation’s culture. A perceived
improvement in the culture will trigger positive cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses to change, as long as cynicism abates (Oreg, 2006) and trust in management
(or at least in some managers) increases (Ferres & Conell, 2004). However, when
culture changes it may be seen as a breach or violation of the psychological contract.
For example, Brooks and Harfield (2000) report on a culture change programme in a
local government authority from a civil service mentality to one of ‘public management’
where the user pays for a service. The cultural change programme, known as Giving
Value - Being Valued, was considered inequitable (Adams, 1965) since the ‘Being
Valued’ component fell short of the effort expended by staff in ‘Giving Value’, and
triggered negative emotions.
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One leadership role, according to Fairholm and Fairholm (2000), is to build a
culture of trust, a point made in the previous research question. A parallel leadership
role may be to create a culture of participation which may well lead to positive
responses to negotiated change (Lines 2004). Harris (2004, p. 395) reports on the
appointment of a new principal and introduction of changes, sponsored by a
government-based improvement project, in a state high school which had once been: highly regarded as a high achieving school with a very traditional, authoritarian culture…
The degree of resistance to this new initiative was particularly evident in the attitudes of
long-serving staff that tended to disassociate themselves from the project by drawing on a
nostalgic and potentially flawed recollection of the past. As one teacher noted: “Things
were much better under the old regime, we were a better school then.”
Schein (2004, p. 309) points out that new leaders, who are often brought in
specifically to change the culture, need to deal with emotional reactions: The infusion of outsiders inevitably brings various cultural assumptions into conflict with
each other, raising discomfort and anxiety levels. Leaders who use this change strategy
therefore have to figure out how to manage the high levels of anxiety and conflict they have
wittingly or unwittingly unleashed.
It was somewhat ironic that the school Harris (2004) referred to as previously
very authoritarian did not respond well to what the staff saw as unilateral changes.
When the principal changed her style to a more participative one, staff engaged in the
changes cautiously but more positively.
Paradoxically, an organisation that seldom consults staff may find that a
unilateral change, even an unpalatable one, is accepted as the norm, whereas an
organisation that invites participation as general rule, but fails to do so during a change,
may find a surprised and somewhat hostile reception. Daly and Geyer (1994) discovered
that explanations of office relocations were related to perceptions of procedural justice
but were puzzled to find little relationship between it and the absence of participation.
They surmised that people did not expect to be consulted. Perceived systemic injustice
(Sheppard et al., 1992; Harlos & Pinder, 2000, Beugré & Baron, 2001) will nevertheless
lend weight to views that an announced change is unfair.
Values are central to culture (Schein, 2004). Ryan (2005) studied a company
that for decades had two key values: innovation and care for its employees. When the
culture changed to a short-term results-oriented one, with what was described a penal
attitude for not meeting targets, innovation and morale both declined. The
communication giant, Cisco, had a culture of innovation but also one that was “brutally
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competitive”, and when results declined it maintained the focus on goals, but, together
with other changes, also began to demand collaboration: Compensation changed too: Instead of getting paid just for meeting targets, top people got
rewarded based on how peers rated them on their teamwork....It wasn’t an easy transition.
Everyone hated the new way at first…Executives didn’t like sharing resources; joint
strategy-setting and decision-making was cumbersome….“The first two years were very
painful”, admits [CEO] Chambers. Some of the most successful people left…Others were
asked to leave. Overall, Chambers estimates, around 10% of his top team “couldn’t make
the transition” (Kirkland, 2007, p. 38).
In an empirical study Kabanoff, Waldersee and Cohen (1995) found that
organisations with different value structures depicted and communicated change
differently, but the authors did not specifically address individual responses. The
construct of person-environment fit, specifically person-organisation fit, suggests that
people whose values are incongruent with those of the organisation will experience job
dissatisfaction (Kristof-Brown, Jansen & Colbert, 2002) and tend to leave
(Vandenberghe, 1999). In an empirical study of person-organisation fit, Caldwell et al.
(2004) found negative perceptions of cultural change in employees who assessed that
new corporate values were incongruent with their own.
The concept of perceived organisational support has been applied to a variety of
organisational contexts. It can refer to how employees perceive the support of individual
managers (Masterson et al., 2000) but is usually more broadly related to perceptions of
organisational systems and culture. Eisenberger, Huntington, Hutchison and Sowa
(1986, p. 500) maintain, “employees in an organization form global beliefs concerning
the extent to which the organization values their contributions and cares about their
well-being” and that this leads to greater organisational commitment, such as reduced
absenteeism. Naumann et al. (1998) researched workers who were informed that they
were to be laid off and found that perceptions of interactional justice contributed to
perceptions of organisational support and that the combined effect was to increase
organisational commitment while they remained on the job. Masterson et al. (2000)
surveyed employees about the introduction of a new performance management system
and reported that employee responses were related to procedural and interactional
justice, perceived organisational support and leader-member relationships. A supportive
organisation is one where people can rely on a variety of organisational resources, and
in the context of change this could involve elements of employee assistance
programmes (Alker & McHugh, 2000) and outplacement programmes, such as
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psychological and career counselling (Rudisill & Edwards, 2002), help with
constructing curricula vitae, methods of job search and interviewing skills. The ways in
which an organisation offers support in downsizing may have flow-on effects to both
wider perceptions of organisational support and of procedural justice (Naumann et al.,
1998). Frost (2002) identifies a very specific aspect of organisational support which he
calls organisational compassion. This includes helping employees deal with traumatic
incidents, at work and elsewhere. There is little research about the emotional effects of
organisational support in the context of organisational change.
It should also be noted that sub-cultures, based on categories such as
department, professional identity, ethnicity and gender, exist in organisations (Ryan,
2005). Researchers have also developed more abstract categories. For example, Palthe
and Kossek (2003) developed a typology of sub-cultures that are employee-centred,
professional-centred, task-centred and innovation-centred, the last being of special
relevance to the present study. Employees’ responses to change are often coloured by
their perceptions of, and engagement in, the sub-culture as well as in the broader
organisational culture (Harris & Ogbonna, 1998, Morgan & Ogbonna, 2008). According
to Armenakis et al. (1993, p. 687), “these cultural memberships may polarize the
beliefs, attitudes and intentions of members” through group discourses (Mills, 2000)
and undermine readiness for change.
The emphasis in this section is on the relationship between organisational
culture, organisational change and emotional experience. According to Ryan (2005, p.
432), organisational culture “represents the often unwritten sense of identity, feeling
part of the organization. It provides a ‘glue’ and understanding in that it can help
individual members make sense of events and change activities.” The emotional aspects
of the organisation’s culture could impact on how emotion is experienced and
expressed. Beyer and Nino (2001) contend that culture shapes emotions by encouraging
the experience of emotions, managing anxiety and providing ways to express emotions.
One of the factors that contributes to the development of culture is the “emotional
intensity of the actual historical experiences” organisational or group members have
shared (Schein, 2004, p. 11). According to Fineman (2001) many organisations
deliberately set out to control and manipulate the emotions of their employees. Studies
on emotional labour document the expectations of organisations that some emotions
should be displayed but not others (Bolton, 2005; Mann, 1999a, 1999b; Smollan
2006c). Huy (1999) refers to the emotionally capable organisation as one where
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emotions are considered legitimate. A healthy organisational culture, according to Pizer
and Härtel (2005), is one where emotional expressiveness is encouraged and value is
placed on emotion work. Ashkanasy and Daus (2002) provide a set of guidelines for
emotionally healthy organisations that includes creating a positive and friendly
emotional climate, and if need be, changing the culture. Ozcelik et al. (2008)
demonstrated how productive a positive emotional climate is for organisational
outcomes.
A study of The Body Shop presents a picture of an organisation where emotional
expressiveness was embedded in the culture (Martin et al., 1998). The authors’ typology
of organisations asserts that feminist types of organisation allow for the open expression
of emotion, originating from private or work spheres, whereas traditional bureaucracies
frown on emotional expression of any type and of any origin, and normative
organisations tolerate some emotional expression but not from outside the work
environment. Similarly, in his qualitative study of healthcare employees N. Clarke
(2006) documents the impact of organisational culture and professional identity in
healthcare organisations which encourage the reflection on, and discussion of, the
emotional aspects of the normal course of work.
Conversely, Van Maanen and Kunda’s (1989) study of Disney found
considerable emotional control over employees who were expected to imbibe and
display a feel-good culture. While the above studies were not done in the context of
organisational change, it is plausible that the discussion of employee emotions during
organisational change could vary substantially from one organisation or profession to
another (Bolton, 2005). Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006) found a number of their
respondents felt the need to hide their emotions about organisational change since their
expression was construed as an inappropriate form of resistance. Turnbull (2002)
studied the ways individuals responded to an organisation’s attempts to deliberately
change its culture to one of trust, openness, innovation and loyalty, in workshops laden
with emotional appeals. She found that employees experienced both cognitive and
affective reactions, but often in unintended ways, with mistrust, anger and
embarrassment often eventuating. Employees reported the need to hide their feelings
and in many cases pretended to comply with the changes. The degree of emotional
labour that surfaces during organisational change can also be an outcome of
organisational culture (Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006) and in addition serve to
perpetuate it. Callahan (2002) found in a qualitative study that control of emotions was
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expected in a non-profit organisation associated with the United States military. She
believed that, despite the need for cultural change, emotion management was
dysfunctional on an organisational level as it prevented adaptive new cultural norms
from emerging, and on an individual level because it continued to marginalise certain
members, noticeably women and younger staff.
Research Question 12: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
to change moderated by the perceived organisational culture?
Perceived Organisational Change Context
In their review of organisational change in the 1990s, Armenakis and Bedian (1999)
assert that a holistic approach needs to be taken that accounts for change content,
processes, outcomes and context. The ways in which people respond to a change can be
viewed from organisational, group and individual levels and each level has a context of
its own. Sub-cultural strength (Ogbonna & Harris, 1998) is one example of how an
internal factor can impact on change at all three levels.
Organisational change takes place within internal and external contexts. While
context has long been regarded as essential to the study (and practice) of strategic
management (e.g. McKiernan, 2006; Pearce & Robinson, 2005; Balogun & Hope-
Hailey, 2004) it has also captured the attention of researchers in organisational
behaviour (e.g. Griffin, 2007). Johns (2006, p. 388) refers to context as “a bundle or
configuration of stimuli” and as a “shaper of meaning” and its salience depends on the
variables one is seeking to investigate. Bacharach et al. (1996) and Bamberger (2008)
insist that to understand organisational change we need to take account of both macro
forces and micro processes. Factors in the external environment, political, economic,
social, technical, ecological and competitive (Pearce & Robinson, 2005), are often the
drivers of change and can impact on, or operate in tandem with, changes in the internal
environment, such as structure, culture, decision-making, leadership, stress and conflict
(Kinicki & Kreitner, 2006). The sudden downturn in the economies of most countries in
late 2008 has already affected many organisations and their employees. The advent of
new owners and/or new managers often signals the beginning of change as the
newcomers seek to make their mark on the organisation or department. Effective
leadership depends on whether the style of leadership matches the environmental
demands. For example, findings from one study indicate that “transformational
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leadership was most effective in dynamic environments and transactional leadership
was most effective in stable environments” (Hmieleski & Ensley, 2007, p. 867).
From a conceptual point of view it is realistic to assume that justification for an
organisational change that occurs as a result of government policy or an environmental
disaster, would produce different perceptions of the need for change than one that is
internally driven. For example, the current economic crisis could lead to a different set
of perceptions about downsizing. Although the outcomes for victims may still be
negative, the emotions could be ones of sadness and anxiety, whereas anger might be
dominant if a company had been mismanaged or redundancies had been ordered to
increase already healthy profits. Employees’ response to a serious workplace accident
could be very different to the introduction of new legislation on health and safety. Even
if there is low readiness for change, a crisis precipitated by an external or internal event
may present problems and opportunities that will need immediate action, which will be
more effectively taken if change leaders, managers and agents have perceived expertise,
trustworthiness (Armenakis et al., 1993) and emotional intelligence (Jordan, 2005; Huy,
2002).
A study by Herold et al. (2007) explored the overlapping influence of factors in
the internal environment (e.g. multiple changes) and the individual factors of fairness
perceptions, change self-efficacy and job outcomes. In their view, individual responses
cannot be effectively researched in a context-free vacuum. The internal context also
includes the scope, scale and frequency of change, which were discussed in Research
Questions 2, 3 and 7. A small change by itself may have a minor impact on the
individual. However, in the context of other changes occurring previously or
simultaneously, it may have an adverse effect if it again requires the expense of extra
effort, even though the change may lead to a better outcome for the individual. In
Research Question 7 on the influence of previous experience of change, mention was
made of the results of a study by Self et al. (2007) of an organisation that, due to
government deregulation and the vastly more competitive environment that ensued, had
experienced many changes in structure, systems and policies, affecting the whole
organisation or parts of it. A range of issues contributed to people’s perceptions of the
ongoing changes such as the frequency and accuracy of information (including features
of the internal and external contexts), leader-member relations and perceived
organisational support. Thus the frequency of change, whether driven by internal or
external factors, or both, becomes an important contextual factor for an organisation.
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Pettigrew et al. (2001) assert that change cannot be understood in isolation of the
contexts of time, space, nationality and ethnicity. As Vandenberghe (1999) points out,
organisational culture cannot be divorced from the wider national culture in which it is
located. Examples of the relevance of timing of change were provided in Research
Question 3 of organisations that soon after downsizing were reported to have increased
the bonuses of senior executives (Ward, 2006), or provided an expensive dinner for the
team which planned the downsizing (TVNZ top brass feast, 2007).
The role of emotion in the various contexts of change has often been overlooked
by researchers. Context does, however, provide the ignition of emotions. A bonus paid
to executives may not elicit much emotion on most occasions but in the context of
downsizing it will provoke anger (Ward, 2006). One New Zealand company that tried to
raise directors fees was met with hostility at its annual general meeting in October 2008
by shareholders who labelled the directors “pigs at a trough” (Contact Energy bows to
pressure, 2008). However, the reactions of employees, who are the focus of this thesis,
were not reported. A social constructionist approach (Mann 1999a; Bolton, 2005)
highlights the influence of nationality and ethnicity in the experience, expression and
suppression of emotion (Bagozzi et al., 2003; Sutton & Rafaeli, 1990). When cultures
collide in terms of emotional expressiveness, such as in the Singapore subsidiary of an
American fast-food company (Tan et al., 2003) problems occur.
The variety and complexity of factors in the internal and external environments
of an organisation during periods of change are therefore essential contributors to the
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to a change. Context is an aspect of
sense-making - an event can be best understood when account is taken of a range of
salient environmental factors.
Research Question 13: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
to change moderated by the perceived change context?
2.6 Summary of Literature Review
Change can be an affective event (Weiss & Cropanzano, 1996) and the model advanced
above extends the literature on organisational change, and in particular, the inter-
relationships between cognitive, affective and behavioural responses. A number of key
points have merged from the literature review.
Firstly, change is potentially emotional, in terms of both outcomes and
processes. Anecdotal references to people resisting being moved out of their comfort
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zones are only partially accurate. When the outcomes of organisational change are
perceived as negative people naturally resent them. But why would people resist change
when the outcomes are an improvement on an existing state of affairs? One important
aspect emerging from the literature review relates to personality. People with traits such
as low change self-efficacy (Jimmieson et al., 2004), dispositional cynicism (Wanberg
& Banas, 2000) and negative affectivity (Watson & Tellegen, 1985) will be disinclined
to resist certain types of change - but certainly not changes where they will definitely
gain. People who are optimistic (Watson & Clark, 1997), open to experience (Vakola, et
al., 2004), and have high self-efficacy (Jimmieson et al., 2004), will respond more
positively to change - but certainly not all change. The processes of change need to be
led and managed with skill (Caldwell, 2003) and emotional intelligence (Huy, 1999;
Jordan, 2005) so that people are inclined to support rather than resist the change. In this
regard, trustworthiness (Hubell & Chory-Assad, 2005) and fairness (Paterson & Cary,
2002) become particularly important.
Secondly, as noted before, there are multiple factors that influence how people
respond to change. Change outcomes and processes can be perceived as having both
positive and negative elements (Kruglanski et al., 2007), and trigger positive and
negative emotions. What is most salient to an individual could lie in any of these factors.
Thirdly, it is people’s perceptions of these multiple factors that are of critical
importance. Two research approaches have been highlighted in the literature review.
Affective reactions to change flow from cognitive processes (Lazarus, 1991) and
cognitive appraisal theory indicates that individuals firstly view events from the
perspective of how they will be affected and then seek to ascertain causes (Cropanzano
et al., 2000; Paterson & Härtel, 2002) and develop coping strategies (Lazarus, 1999;
Folkman & Lazarus, 1988). Social constructionist approaches take the position that the
way people think, feel and behave is shaped by social forces (Zembylas, 2006), and that
these operate during organisational change (Fineman, 2003; Mills, 2000).
The focus of this study is how people perceive the factors surrounding
organisational change - factors relating to the changes themselves, factors within
themselves, factors in the leaders managers and agents of change, and factors within the
organisational culture and context. In total, 13 research questions have been posed.
Investigation them will shed light on the complex nature of organisational change and
add to knowledge of how it can be better understood, led, managed and experienced.
The methodology section that follows indicates how interviews allow the researcher to
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get into the hearts and minds of participants, as they travel on the rollercoaster of
organisational change.
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CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY
3.1 Introduction
In the introduction to this thesis I outlined my firm belief, based on support from a
number of other qualitative researchers (e.g. Miles & Huberman, 1994; Zerbe & Härtel,
2000; Hyde, 2000; Patton, 2002), that a qualitative approach can be used to explore a
model, which is usually tested in quantitative fashion. In the literature review, social
constructionist approaches to emotions, change and a number of other constructs were
highlighted. In this chapter I provide a more detailed review of why I chose a
qualitative/constructionist approach to explore employee responses to organisational
change through the medium of semi-structured interviews. I also reflect on the
ontological, epistemological and methodological issues that arose in the development
and implementation of the research process.
3.2 Choice of a Qualitative/Social Constructionist Approach
The Goals of Qualitative Research
There has been extensive debate about the competing merits of quantitative and
qualitative research, with the catchphrase ‘paradigm wars’ an oft-used title (e.g. Burrell
& Morgan, 1979; Gage, 1989; Oakley, 1999) and the proclamation of a ‘ceasefire’
(Mingers, 2004). I have no intention of joining sides. Each form of enquiry produces a
different type of knowledge and has its own army of adherents, some of whom aim at
“hegemony or supremacy” (Guba & Lincoln, 2005, p. 191), some of whom are content
with peaceful co-existence if not integration (Wolfram Cox & Hassard, 2005). I
believed at the outset, and this has been reinforced by proceeding through this study,
that for me it is simply more interesting to engage with people directly about their
experience of organisational change by means of an interview, rather than by other
means. The idiographic research approach to research “stresses the importance of letting
one’s subject unfold its nature and characteristics during the process of investigation”
(Burrell & Morgan, 1979, p. 6) and produces in-depth, rich descriptions (Denzin &
Lincoln, 2003).
According to Gubrium and Holstein (1997, p. 12): Qualitative research is…distinguished by a commitment to studying social life in process,
as it unfolds…Seeing people as active agents of their affairs, qualitative enquiry has
traditionally focused on how purposeful actors participate in, construct, deeply experience,
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or imagine their lives.
Veal (2005, pp. 125-126) sums up the advantages of using this approach: • qualitative methods enable the researcher to understand and explain in detail the
personal experiences of individuals;
• qualitative research focuses on people’s understanding and interpretations rather than seeking external ‘laws’ for behaviour;
• qualitative research allows the researcher to experience research issues from a participant’s perspective;
• qualitative methods are useful in examine personal changes over time.
Guba and Lincoln (2005, p. 204) point out that “Social scientists concerned with
the expansion of what count as social data rely increasingly on the experiential, the
embodied, the emotive qualities of human experience that contribute to the narrative
quality of life.” Other qualitative researchers (e.g. Ellis, 1991; Gubrium & Holstein,
1997) also specifically identify the affective domain of life, inside and outside of work,
as a particularly meaningful area of study.
The distinctions between emic and etic forms of research are taken from the
fields of anthropology and other social sciences (Harris, 1976). Emic researchers seek to
capture the world as seen by those inside a culture. This is usually done through in-
depth observation and immersion in the group being studied and through interviews. On
the other hand, etic researchers look for explanations of behaviour that are derived from
a scientific, external view, where the concepts being studied are subjected to categories
meaningful to the researcher and amenable to comparison across groups (Morris,
Leung, Ames & Lickel, 1999). Morris et al. and Patton (2002) indicate that researchers
from one perspective have often discounted the other. However, they believe that both
approaches can be used in tandem. The etic approach provides an initial framework for
the emic investigation; alternatively emic approaches can be used to develop a
comparative (etic) framework.
This study of emotions and change integrates both perspectives. Although emic
perspectives are commonly used to study a group of people from the same culture and
with depth approaches, they can also be used, through interviews (Morris et al., 1998),
to capture the meanings of change and the emotions experienced by individuals in
different cultural settings. Denzin and Lincoln (2005a, p. 12) indicate that “Qualitative
researchers…are committed to an emic, idiographic, case-based position that direct
attention to specific cases.” The aim of the current study, therefore, was to find what
meanings the participants themselves ascribed to experience. For example, the term
resistance to change has different meanings to different researchers (Piderit, 2000;
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Bovey & Hede, 2001a; Ford et al., 2002). Research into fairness has also found
evidence of similarities (Mikula et al., 1998) and differences across cultures - national,
ethnic and organisational (Morris et al., 1998). In the context of this study, the meaning
of the term from an emic perspective should highlight how different change players
could interpret the fairness of an organisational change.
Research is seldom value-free (Guba, 1990) and its outputs to a large extent
depend on the ideological preferences of the researchers. Various writers have
commented on the issues that lie under the surface of a qualitative investigation.
Lincoln and Denzin (1998, pp. 408-409) assume that qualitative researchers have a
humanistic bent from which flows the “liberal and radical politics” of the various
paradigms, and that qualitative researchers, including constructivists: all share the belief that that a politics of liberation must always begin with the perspectives,
desires, and dreams of those individuals and groups who have been oppressed by the larger
ideological, economic, and political forces of a society or historical moment.
In their invitation to authors to contribute to the third edition of The Sage
Handbook of Qualitative Research, the editors, Denzin and Lincoln (2005b, p. x), make
their position clear, “We want the new edition to advance a democratic project
committed to social justice in an age of uncertainty.” In the preface to the third edition
of The Landscape of Qualitative Practice, the same editors (Denzin & Lincoln, 2008, p.
viii) identify the theme of the book as “the necessity to reengage the promise of
qualitative research as a generative form of radical democratic practice.”
Similarly, Lincoln (1995), Tierney (2003) and Bryant (2003) take the
ideological position that participant voices must not be silenced, disengaged or
marginalised. While this philosophy might capture some of the spirit of qualitative
research, it seems more indicative of critical theory (Alvesson & Deetz, 2000; Putnam,
1983; Guba, 1990; Cresswell, 1998) and cannot be the sole interpretation of the goals of
qualitative research as a whole. While Guba (1990) contends that a constructivist
approach cannot be value-free (and this could be taken to refer to the values of either the
researcher or the researched), Harris (2006, p. 226) points out that in studying the
construct of inequality: Constructionist researchers would not assume that their first priority is to identify the
causes and effects of, and the solutions to objective inequality; instead, their main objective
would be to study how people create the meaning of inequality by making assertions about
its putative causes, effects and solutions.
In this thesis, while I share some of the emancipatory zeal of Lincoln and
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Denzin (1998) and Bryant (2003), the concept of justice is an integral part of the model
and interview questions on justice are designed to present the voices of the participants.
Views have been expressed that it is the non-managers who are the most marginalised
(Bryant, 2003; Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006). This may well be true but other
researchers have found that managers at all levels have also been sidelined in change
programmes where they had insufficient power or authority to influence change in the
way they would have liked (e.g. Turnbull, 1999; Young, 2000; Huy, 2002; Vince,
2006).
Interpretivism, Constructivism and Social Constructionism
While there are fine differences between interpretivist and constructivist approaches to
research (see Schwandt, 1998, 2003 for an elaboration), the terms have often been used
interchangeably (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005a). Interpretive practice, according to Holstein
and Gubrium (2005, p. 484), is the “constellation of procedures, conditions, and
resources through which reality is apprehended, understood, organized and conveyed in
everyday life.” Interpretivists seek to uncover the meanings people attach to their
experiences and these meanings are primarily derived from verbal and non-verbal
communication.
Broadly speaking, interpretivist approaches aim to provide rich or thick
descriptions of issues and events (Denzin & Lincoln, 2003), “finely nuanced accounts”
(Gergen & Gergen, 2000, p. 1027) and “deep insights” (Arksey & Knight, p. 7), to
uncover not merely what people think or feel or do, but also why and how. Interpretivist
approaches are particularly able to capture the why and how to a depth that cannot be
accessed by quantitative approaches. For example, in referring to coping with stress-
induced events, Folkman and Moskowitz (2000, 2004) suggest that quantitative
accounts usually only reveal superficial descriptions of experience and that narrative
accounts offer more insight. Similarly, Lazarus (2006) notes, for example, that a coping
questionnaire provides useful information but that this cannot be separated from the
personal circumstances of the individual or of the context in which the emotion has
been provoked. People construct their versions of reality by trying to making sense or
meaning of experience (Weick, 1995). Researchers then reconstruct or co-construct the
reality (Schwandt, 1998; Gomm, 2004; Mason, 2002), as viewed by participants. One
goal is to build a picture of individual experience that is subjective, holistic, complex,
contextual, sometimes confusing, messy and often contradictory (Cresswell, 1998;
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Deetz, 1996; Richards, 2005; Mason, 2002).
A point worth exploring is the contention of Putnam (1983, p. 36) that
interpretivists “believe that individuals create their own environments. They act and
interpret their interactions with a sense of free will and choice, thus they have a critical
role in shaping environmental and organizational realities.” This idealistic approach
seems to put the employee at centre stage in determining individual and organisational
outcomes. In the context of the current study, while the model presented indicates that
employees’ reactions to change may affect some facets of the change process, their
impact would be contingent on many other factors, such as the power of various
stakeholders, managerial prerogatives, organisational policies and financial, legal and
competitive constraints (Oreg, 2006; Holt et al., 2007).
Guba (1990) prefers to use the term constructivism, which has a relativist
ontological position - there are multiple ‘realities’; a subjectivist epistemology -
findings are the product of the interaction of the researcher and the researched; and
either or both hermeneutical and dialectical methodologies - the former requiring
accuracy of depiction of an individual construction, the latter involving comparing and
contrasting different viewpoints. According to Denzin and Lincoln (1994, p. 27), the
constructivist approach considers that “realities exist in the form of multiple
constructions, socially and experientially based, local and specific, dependent for their
form and content on the persons who hold them.”
Qualitative research takes a defined epistemological position: Knowledge is within meanings people make of it; knowledge is gained through people
talking about their meanings; knowledge is laced with personal biases and values;
knowledge is written in a personal, close-up way; and knowledge evolves, emerges, and is
inextricably tied to the context in which it is studied (Cresswell, 1998, p. 19).
According to Kidd (2004) the terms constructivism and constructionism are also
often confused or used interchangeably. She suggests, however, that constructivism
refers to the way in which descriptions and accounts construct the world, while
constructionism refers to the processes by which the accounts themselves are
constructed. Gergen (1994, p. 67) identifies constructivism as a “class of psychological
theories…which place particular stress on the individual’s psychological construction of
the experiential world”, whereas social constructionism is a sociological approach that
views the individual’s understanding of experience as being created through and by
language. Similarly, Crotty (1998, p. 58) believes that:
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It would appear useful, then, to reserve the term constructivism for the epistemological
considerations focusing exclusively on the ‘meaning-making activity of the individual
mind’ and to use constructionism where the focus includes ‘the collective generation of
meaning’…Constructivism in this sense points out the unique experience of each of
us…On the other hand, social constructionism emphasizes the hold our culture has on us: it
shapes the way we see things (even the way we feel things!) and gives us a quite definite
view of the world.
The use of the adjective ‘social’ in social constructionism reveals the philosophy
that a person’s concept of ‘reality’ is (wholly or partly) developed through the influence
of others. Putnam (1983, p. 35), for example, reports that “interpretivists believe that
reality is socially constructed through the words, symbols and behaviours of its
members.” Easterby-Smith, Thorpe and Lowe (2002, p. 30) advise that in using a
constructionist approach: One should therefore try to understand and explain why people have different experiences,
rather than search for causes and fundamental laws to explain their behaviour. Human
action arises from the sense that people make of different situations, rather than as a direct
response from external stimuli.
It is, however, difficult to understand why they choose to ignore the study of
causes of behaviour unless they are concerned about avoiding the generalisations of a
nomothetic approach and focusing instead on idiographic accounts of experience
(Burrell & Morgan, 1979; Wolfram Cox & Hassard, 2005).
While different methodological approaches of qualitative research were
available to me (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994; Mason, 2002; Schwandt, 2003), the social
constructionist approach was the most attractive because it focuses on the subjective
nature of experience, and how this experience has been shaped by social forces as
perceived through individual lenses. Social constructionism has underpinned some of
the literature on emotions (Kemper, 2000; Fineman, 2000b), particularly in the field of
emotional labour (e.g. Hochschild, 1983; Bolton, 2005; Mann, 1999b), organisational
change (e.g. Mills, 2000; Ford et al., 2002) and a number of other constructs that I have
used in the model, such as organisational justice (Lamertz, 2002), trust (Shamir &
Lapidot, 2003), the nature of time in organisational life (Ancona et al., 2001; Clark,
1990), leadership (Meindl, 1995; Grint, 2005) and organisational culture (Pedersen &
Dobbin, 2006). Social constructionism therefore seemed to be an appropriate theoretical
platform from which to launch this thesis.
“A general assumption of social constructionism is that knowledge is not
disinterested, apolitical, and exclusive of affective and embodied aspects of human
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experience, but is in some sense ideological, political and permeated with values”
(Schwandt, 2003, p. 307). There are a number of different approaches to the concept of
social constructionism (Hibberd, 2003; Stam, 2001). Schwandt (2003) distinguishes
between ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ forms. The former takes the view that people’s
understanding of the world is influenced by the many discourses they have been party
to, a stance taken by Berger and Luckmann (1966). The latter, a position held by Gergen
(1985, 1994) and Denzin (1997) is that discursive experience has determined people’s
understanding.
The origins of the construct lie in the book by Berger and Luckmann (1966), The
Social Construction of Reality. From an ontological perspective, people embrace a
version of reality derived from a variety of social influences and personal experiences,
including personal interaction and more abstract relationships, and this ‘reality’ changes
with new experiences (Wolfram Cox & Hassard, 2007).
Gergen (1985, p. 268) stimulated considerable interest in social constructionism
in psychology by laying it down as a challenge to “the objective basis of conventional
knowledge.” Knowledge is built through social interaction and, according to Gergen
and Thatchenkerry (2004, p. 109), “discourse, perhaps is the most critical medium
through which meanings are fashioned.” Values and beliefs, which are embedded and
institutionalised in culture, are the foundations of the edifice that people build to house
their understanding of experience. People make sense of this experience by resorting to
the meanings and language that they have been taught to bring to new stimuli. Language
in a postmodern way of thinking does not merely reflect reality, it constitutes it (Gergen
& Thatchenkerry, 2004). The language used does not simply report on experience, it
attaches social meaning that is imbued with values and subjective judgements. For
example, people’s understanding of the term ‘resistance to change’ reflects social
influences and the rhetoric used by change players and researchers (Ford et al., 2002;
Mills, 2000). Similarly, the language used by managers of downsizing (who referred to
themselves as ‘grim reapers’ and ‘executioners’) conveys a harsh, socially constructed
reality (Clair & Dufresne, 2004; Gandolfi, 2008) in which these managers seem to
implicitly agree with the criticism, or at least the description, of their roles.
Social Construction of Emotions, Change and Other Factors in the Model
In the literature review the social constructionist approach was applied to a number of
constructs used in this thesis: emotions, change, justice, time, leadership, trust and
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organisational culture. These concepts are revisited here.
The social constructionist perspective of emotions underlies much of the
literature on emotional labour (e.g. Hochschild, 1983; Mann, 1999a, 1999b; Bolton;
2005; Smollan, 2006c). It takes the view that emotions are phenomena that are
culturally mediated (Antonacopoulou & Gabriel, 2001) and developed through
interaction in social relationships. Cultural factors influence not merely the experience
of specific emotions, such as shame, anger or pride, but influence how appropriate their
display is. Commenting on this approach, Callahan and McCollum (2002, p. 14)
indicate that “emotions are created or constructed as part of a common sense-making
process in social structures” and that “social constructionism knits together the personal
and the social.” Barsade et al. (2003, p. 15) point out that even within social
constructionist approaches to emotions in organisations there are different perspectives,
with some writers preferring to focus on the social forces that impact on the display of
emotions and the suppression of emotional display, while others concentrate on “how
specific social structures and local norms shape individual behaviour, and, particularly,
the experience and expression of affect.” Harré (1986), who refers to these culturally
situated norms as the ‘local moral order’, points out how the lexicon of emotions varies
from one society to another. He thus exemplifies the ‘strong’ social constructionist
position that while emotions may be accompanied by physiological responses, language
- as mediated through discursive practice - determines people’s understanding of both
what emotions mean and how appropriate are their experience and expression. ‘Weaker’
social constructionist perspectives on emotions, according to Williams and Bendelow
(1996), hold greater promise of enriching our understanding of emotions as the complex
interplay between physiological, cognitive and social forces.
A social constructionist view of organisational change takes the position that
those affected can perceive a change in different ways (Mills, 2000). The nature of the
rhetoric used signals how a change player (or researcher) portrays experience. For
example, to gain commitment to a change, a change leader could frame it as an exciting
move for the organisation and its personnel. However, change recipients might view the
impending change with anxiety as they perceive negative outcomes such as increased
workloads (O’Connell Davidson, 1994; Shapiro & Kirkman, 1999) or possible
redundancies (Bean & Hamilton, 2006). Discourse produces multiple perspectives
which influence the thoughts, emotions and actions of those engaged.
The term, resistance to change, is fraught with ideological interpretations and
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could be viewed as reluctance, refusal, obstruction, defiance of authority, promotion of
alternative actions and so on (Coetsee, 1999; Bovey & Hede, 2001a; Bryant, 2006;
Matheny, 2004). The connotations people give to the term are often developed through
multiple discourses on organisational change (Ford et al., 2002). Leaders of change
often construct resistance as a negative force, and given their positional power, they
often control the rhetoric of change to suit their own ends (Badham & Buchanan,
2008). From an epistemological perspective the words used by various actors and the
researcher may reflect different meanings. Organisational politics and mechanisms of
influence occur in change-related scenarios where different constructions of events,
motives and potential outcomes are sometimes rampant (Dawson, 2003; Buchanan &
Badham, 1999). For example, Ford et al. (2002, p. 106) propose that: resistance is a function of the socially constructed reality in which someone lives, and that
depending on the nature of that constructed reality, the form of resistance to change will
vary. Since constructed realities provide the context in which people act and interact, the
nature of these realities establishes the opportunities for action, how people will see the
world, what actions to take, etc. Accordingly, change, and resistance to it, is a function of
the constructed reality; it is the nature of this reality that gives resistance its particular form,
mood and flavour.
Ford et al. (2002) also suggest that it is the myriad conversations around change
that form the background against which people construct their own realities of the
change. Visible or vocal acceptance of, or resistance to, change therefore depends
partly on how an individual gauges the appropriateness (and consequences) of public
responses, as the quotes from Turnbull (1999) and Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006)
reveal. People in management positions are expected to support changes, even when
they do not agree with them. This socially constructed assumption is contained within
the term - ‘acting professionally’ (Fournier, 1999; Lively, 2000; Harris, 2002) - which
is further manifested in the expectation to reveal only ‘appropriate emotions’ about the
change.
Integrating social constructionist approaches to emotions and change, it is
evident that discussions about the emotions of the change also contribute to the
perceived reality. According to Kiefer (2002b, p. 45), “Such expressed and
communicated emotions influence group processes, organizational climate, as well as
the individual and social construction of change.” Some of the participants (middle
managers) in Turnbull’s (1999, p. 133) study of emotional labour and cultural change in
an organisation remarked, “People have to say they’re committed”; “You keep your
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head down”; “You do what your manager wants you to do.” Another was more specific
about the emotional climate: “In a fear culture it is difficult to protest” (p. 134).
Respondents in Bryant and Wolfram Cox’s (2006, p. 123) study made similar
comments, such as, “We had to hide what we felt”; “could not show how it affected us.”
Other factors in the model have been subjected to a social constructionist
analysis. One of the dominant themes was the concern for justice shown by the
participants, which Lamertz (2002) believes is also a socially constructed concept. As I
argue in the literature review, people’s notions of justice are potentially derived from
multiple sources, one of the most powerful being their many social experiences. Time in
organisational settings is both subjectively and collectively interpreted (Ancona et al.,
2006; Clark, 1990; Pettigrew et al., 2001) and can be seen, for example, against the
backdrop of expected cycles and pacing of organisational change (Huy, 2001; Jansen,
2004). The concepts of leadership and followership are also considered to be social
constructions (Meindl, 1995; Grint, 2005). Discussions by followers about the abilities
and personalities of organisational leaders, and by leaders about followers, shape the
perceptions of both about the two roles. Feedback in both directions becomes part of the
construction process. Shamir and Lapidot (2003) have shown that trust is not merely an
individual disposition, or an element of interpersonal relationships, but also a socially
constructed notion that arises from issues and experiences on a broader organisational
level. While there are dispositional influences and personal interpretations of dyadic and
group relationships, people also base their trust in leaders on the related and observed
experiences of others (Dunn & Schweitzer, 2005).
Organisational culture is almost by definition a social construction, as it is a
system of shared meaning (Pizer & Härtel, 2005) by which organisations
simultaneously copy the cultural practices of other organisations while trying to evolve
their own unique style and identity (Pedersen & Dobbin, 2006). People in organisations
absorb, to varying depths, the cultural precepts, taught or observed, that are prevalent
(Schein, 2004). The values that penetrate organisational culture are themselves social
constructions that are reinforced in formal and informal ways. The distinction between
organisational cultures which are geared or resistant to change was highlighted in the
literature review (e.g. Lashinsky, 2006; Berner, 2007). Organisational culture was also
highlighted as a key feature of emotional labour (e.g. Bolton, 2005; Mann, 1999b),
particularly in the context of change (Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006; Turnbull, 1999).
The emotional culture of an organisation (Zembylas, 2006) provides ground rules for
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expected expression or suppression of emotion (Van Maanen & Kunda, 1989; Martin et
al; 1998; Gabriel, 1998).
In summary, many aspects of the emotions of change have been viewed in the
literature through a social constructionist lens. Positive and negative responses to
change often spread through a process of contagion (Hatfield et al., 1993; Barsade,
2002) and influence individual cognitive, affective and behavioural responses. Yet the
individual may still interpret events in an idiosyncratic way because he/she has been
party to other discourses, has had different experiences and has a different disposition.
3.3 Epistemological and Methodological Issues
In this section I explore some of the key issues that underlie a constructionist study,
specifically pertaining to the development, collection and interpretation of material.
From both epistemological and methodological points of view one needs to distinguish
between the ways in which experiences are constructed by people to make meaning of
situations and the researcher’s attempt to make meaning of the reported experiences of
participants. Seidman (2006) and Guba (1990) agree that the construction of the
meaning of a participant’s experience is a function of the interaction between
interviewer and interviewee. Schwandt (1998, p. 222) summarises the roles of the
researcher and the participants in a constructivist or interpretivist approach: The constructivist or interpretivist approach believes that to understand this world of
meaning one must interpret it. The inquirer must elucidate the process of meaning
construction and clarify what and how meanings are embodied in the language and actions
of social actors. To prepare an interpretation is itself to construct a reading of these
meanings; it is to offer the inquirer’s construction of the constructions of the actors one
studies.
Construction of experience thus takes place on various levels. In any form of
primary research the researcher must first decide what factors are worth including. The
end result may at first seem fairly arbitrary to the reader but if done well by the
researcher it becomes convincing. Some of the factors may emerge from perceived gaps
in the literature, some from personal experience, including observation and
conversation, some simply because they are of interest to the researcher. The breadth of
factors included also depends partly on the aims of the researcher. Does he/she
investigate a few factors, as many as possible, or let the factors emerge from the
narratives of the subjects? And if, for example, issues arise that were not originally
conceptualised in a carefully planned investigation, are they ignored or factored into the
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interpretation of the findings? In addition, how deeply does the researcher go? The
nature of the material provided by respondents depends, therefore, on what the
researcher was exploring and how she or he went about mining it. A weakness of the
“traditional question and answer” interview, according to Holloway and Jefferson
(2000, p. 31) is that the interviewer decides what the themes are, the order in which they
will be presented and the language in which they couch their questions. This can limit
the nature of the answers given in a way that a more open narrative approach might not.
Conversely, narrative accounts (Boje, 2001) and grounded theory approaches (Strauss
& Corbin, 1998) may not engage concepts that the researcher thinks may be relevant
and will therefore remain unexplored.
In this study the range of factors to be investigated was intentionally wide but I
did not exclude the possibility that other factors may have played a role. Had fewer
factors been investigated, but to a greater depth, the findings would have looked quite
different to those presented in the next chapter. Had more factors been included and had
more or fewer or different questions been asked, the results would again look different.
Any claim that a researcher has ‘uncovered’ people’s experience of change can only
partially be substantiated. The reader therefore has to contend with the author’s
construction of which factors were relevant.
The participant’s construction of the experience of change first occurs through
examination of the issues, causes and consequences surrounding it, then through
reflection, and even later and more concretely through the articulation of language. The
words participants use in interviews are the outcomes of retrospective, and therefore
reconstructive, processes. The ‘reality’ they refer to is that which was recalled in the
interview, and not necessarily that of the time of the change. Thus interviews are likely
to trigger some memories, but not all.
The next level of construction is that made by the researcher of the constructions
of the participants (Schwandt, 1998). In one sense this is the co-construction of events
referred to by Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006). Transcript material can provide a
wealth of detail and the choice of the researcher in deciding what to use is subjective.
Additionally, the researcher and subject may place different meanings on words, as the
discussion of the interpretation of ‘resistance to change’ in this study indicates. When
people are given - and take - the opportunity to add to or in any way amend the details
of a transcript, which was part of my interview protocol, they may to some extent
indicate agreement with the interviewer’s construction of the conversation. However,
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my participants chose not to comment on the content of what had been recorded in the
interviews, nor added new material. Secondly, they did not get to see the analysis of
textual data and may therefore not agree with my interpretations.
My own biases and values may be detected in the constructions I place on the
constructions of the participants. I have experienced change in various organisations
where I have worked, as change leader, manager, agent and recipient. In my current
organisation alone changes have included a new strategic direction, new organisational
and departmental cultures and leaders, restructuring, redundancies, office relocations,
and changes in technology, schedules and policies. I have been party to many discourses
on change in this organisation (and others), at different hierarchical levels, and in many
contexts. My own perceptions of these events and their affective and behavioural
components could have influenced my constructions of the reports of participants in this
study. So too could the professional body and academic workshops or conferences on
change I have attended and the classes on change I have taught. I therefore had to be
aware of these potential influences. One source, cited in Gergen and Gergen (2000, p.
1033) suggested that her ethnicity did not give her “insider status” in researching
another ethnic group but that shared experience enabled her to provide a “comparative
perspective that is implicit, intuitive and informed by my own identities and
positionalities.” Likewise, my experience has provided me with useful insight into
organisational change processes, and their causes and consequences, but could well
have coloured both the interview questions and the analysis of the responses. Issues of
this nature are explored in more depth later on.
Arguing against the conventional wisdom that researchers should be
dispassionate and objective in the research process, Gubrium and Holstein (1997, p. 59)
suggest that ‘emotionalists’ (defined as qualitative researchers of emotion) “plunge
directly into the subjective fray, at times becoming passionately engrossed.” Similarly,
Ellis (1991) suggests that researchers of emotions should reflect on their own emotional
experience as a means of better understanding those of their subjects. She goes even
further by suggesting that, within limits, researchers can express their own emotions in
the context, for example, of fieldwork or interviews, to encourage the subjects to open
themselves to emotional expression. “In interactive introspections, the researcher works
back and forward with others to facilitate their self-introspections. The object of study is
the emergent experience of both parties” (p. 129). However, I mostly resisted this
temptation, and this degree of co-construction, opting for the more traditional, objective
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- and dispassionate - approach. On a few occasions, however, I admitted to participants
that I had experienced similar reactions to them. This did not appear to affect the nature
of the interview in any way, or influence the data.
Where there are two or more researchers different constructions are brought into
play. As part of the process of writing a thesis a researcher presents an analysis of data
to supervisors. Their comments influence the final product. The first conference paper
that emerged from the empirical work in this study (Smollan, Matheny & Sayers, 2007)
went through various stages of co-construction. I had conducted the interviews and
produced a table of quotes on the chosen theme and an analysis of them. Then all three
of us separately analysed the table and the transcripts and discussed our interpretations.
Other joint conference papers and the book chapter (Matheny & Smollan, 2005) were
the outcome of a process of co-construction. The final level of construction is that
which the reader brings to the researcher’s interpretation of the participants’ responses.
Each person in the chain of construction of meaning may have a different interpretation.
3.4 Method
We can learn…through interviewing, about people’s interior experiences. We can learn
what people perceived and how they interpreted their perceptions. We can learn how events
affect their thoughts and feelings. We can learn the meanings to them of their relationships,
their families, their work, and their selves. We can learn all about the experiences, from joy
through grief, that together constitute the human condition (Weiss, 1994, p. 1).
The Participants
In the initial approach participants were sourced from New Zealand-based management
and human resource consultants whom I knew. I approached third parties so that I had
no prior knowledge of the potential participants and no previous relationship with them.
To protect participants’ identities I agreed with the consultants that I would not use all
the names they provided, nor inform them of who I had or had not interviewed. When
this method provided too few participants, I expanded my sources of ‘consultants’ to
include academic colleagues. In total 10 contacts put me in touch with the interviewees.
Participants provided demographic details on a participant information sheet and were
advised that they could withdraw their consent at any time prior to data analysis. They
were informed that they would be given an opportunity to read the transcript and add or
amend details. Only two, however, made minor (grammatical) changes to the
transcripts.
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Between March 2006 and April 2007 I interviewed 24 people in Auckland.
There were 13 men and 11 women, 16 European, two Maori, three Asian and three of
Pacific Island background. At the time of the interview (not the change) six participants
were in their thirties, 12 in their forties and six in their fifties. They were employed in a
wide range of industries and types of organisation in the private, public and non-profit
sectors, such as manufacturing, retail, travel and tourism, distribution, healthcare,
community services, professional services and communication. The participants also
worked in a variety of different functional departments such as engineering,
production/operations, human resources, client services and accounting. The relatively
high proportion of human resource professionals/consultants (nine) could be attributed
to their part of the network of contacts identified by the human resource and
management consultants I approached. I aimed to obtain a cross-section of hierarchical
levels, and from my interpretation of the role they described, ascertained that there were
eight non-managers, one first-level manager, two middle managers, 10 senior managers,
two general managers and one business owner. In the literature review it was pointed
out that the roles of players in change cannot always be easily distinguished and this
proved to be true in this study. While some of the participants were simply change
recipients, others played a combination of roles in various aspects of the change,
including those of change leaders and change managers, but none were change agents in
the sense I have used in this study - internal or external consultants. Hierarchy was not
always the determining factor. A table of participant details is found in Appendix 1 in
which participants are coded from A to Y, excluding I.
The Interviews
A semi-structured interview was the preferred method since it allows for an examination
of cognitive and emotional processes, with “an emphasis on depth, nuance, complexity
and roundedness” (Mason, 2002, p. 65), and lets the researcher “get closer to the actor’s
perspective” (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994, p. 5). Lee (1993, p. 104) specifically refers to
depth or unstructured interviews as “providing the means of getting beyond surface
appearances and permitting greater sensitivity to the meaning contexts surrounding
informant utterances.” Semi-structured interviews may have similar impact if sufficient
scope is given to exploration of participant comments. Responses to change can be
multi-faceted. For example, some aspects might be construed as fair and produce
positive or no emotion. Some aspects might be perceived as very unfair and trigger
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anger and frustration. These two different perceptions and emotions have different
triggers and different consequences and using a semi-structured interview allows the
researcher to uncover issues of complexity, and sometimes of contradiction,
ambivalence and confusion (Cresswell, 1998).
Fontana and Frey (2003, p. 74) distinguish between the aims of structured and
unstructured interviews, with the former focused on: capturing precise data of a codable nature in order to explain behaviour within
preestablished categories, whereas the latter attempts to understand the complex behaviour
of members of society without imposing any prior categorization that may limit the field of
inquiry.
A semi-structured interview format was designed and after two interviews was
modified. Questions on emotion management and behaviour were left to later. A general
question on fairness was modified to capture the four main types identified by Colquitt
(2001) - distributive, procedural, informational and interpersonal. Since respondents did
not always identify emotional responses I later repeated one question many times as
different facets of change were explored, that is, “And did this have an emotional
impact on you?” The revised version contained over 40 questions, which on a
continuum from structured to unstructured, tends towards the former (see Appendix 2).
The interviews began with a less structured approach, with an indication that the
researcher would first ask for a description of the change(s) and the participant’s
emotional reactions, then move to specific aspects of the change and the emotions they
evoked. The purpose of this approach was firstly to allow the respondents to get
comfortable with the interview protocol by describing what happened, and secondly to
highlight the emotions, and their causes and consequences, that first came to mind. It is
plausible that for some participants the most memorable emotional responses were
surfaced in this fashion. Other participants would progress through the interview and
highlight different issues which may have been of equal or greater intensity, or which
had more serious consequences.
A priori categories had been established for later questions and were based on
the model, which itself was derived from key conceptual and empirical work detailed in
the literature review. The next group of questions was therefore designed to investigate
the variables that mediate cognitive responses to change (Research Question 1 to 4,
which were about outcomes, scale, temporal issues and fairness). They were then asked
a summary question (number 23), “Based on what you have said so far…what were
your views on how positive or negative these changes were?” The purpose was for them
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to reflect on the combined influence of the various factors which they had discussed so
far.
The interview then moved on to the variables in the interviewees that moderated
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change (Research Questions 5 to 8, on
emotional intelligence, disposition, previous experience of change, and change and
stress outside the workplace). After questions designed to provide insight into the
interviewees’ emotional intelligence and its relationship to emotional labour, questions
were inserted to explore behavioural responses, and specifically resistance to change.
The balance of questions relating to the individual were then asked.
The next group of questions were designed to explore the factors that the
interviewees perceived in the leaders and/or managers of change (Research Questions 9
to 11, on leadership ability, emotional intelligence and trustworthiness). The last two
questions explored factors in the organisation (Research Questions 12 and 13 on its
culture and change context). The purpose of the last question, “Were there any other
organisational issues that affected your responses to the change?”, was aimed at
surfacing context issues, and anything else that the interviewees recalled, but since
many context factors had been covered in the course of the interview few participants
responded.
Many of the answers needed exploration, clarification and confirmation. The
main aim was to capture the experience of change, as narrated by respondents, rather
than to lead the respondents to produce answers that neatly fit the boxes in the model.
The order of questions was not always strictly adhered to. At times respondents
discussed an issue that would have been raised later. If respondents indicated that an
issue did not have an emotional impact on them I moved on but may have returned to it
if something contradictory or ambiguous was said later.
Rosenblatt (2002, p. 897) reports on his technique for digging deeper for the
‘truth’ and one that I attempted to follow: …on important matters I often return to a question that seemingly has been answered
completely. I might ask the question from a different angle, or with different words, or with
additional permission to the interviewee to say something that is embarrassing or difficult.
Or I might ask that the question be answered from another perspective. I might frame the
renewed questioning as a matter of aiding interviewee memory, so the whole truth can be
given. Or I might frame it as looking for additional specifics.
The complex nature of interviewing has been discussed by several researchers.
Fontana and Frey (2003, p. 62) suggest that “Increasingly, qualitative researchers are
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realizing that interviews are not neutral tools of data gathering but active interactions
between two (or more) people, leading to negotiated, contextually based results.” They
contrast the traditional concept of the interviewer as a passive and neutral recorder of
information with creative interviewing, which is “based on feelings: it assumes that
researchers, qua interviewers, need to ‘get to know’ respondents beneath their rational
facades, and that researchers can reach respondents’ deep wells of emotion by engaging
them, by sharing feelings and thoughts with them” (p. 91). Through this process the data
is constructed by both interviewer and interviewee and this conceptualisation of the
nature of interviewing supports the idea that the text is negotiated or co-constructed
(Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006).
As Schneider (2000, p. 162) puts it: detailed analyses reveals the interview not simply as an opportunity for knowledge to be
transmitted from one person to another but rather as an interactional accomplishment in
which knowledge is constructed by interviewer and interviewee during the course of the
interview. In this view, interviewers are no longer simply conduits for answers but rather
are deeply implicated in the production of answers.
A problem with this conceptualisation of interviewing is the assumption that the
text is negotiated. The interviewee is asked questions and (usually) responds. If the
interviewer seeks confirmation or clarification of a point or of a concept, one could say
the understanding is negotiated. However, when writing up an analysis the interviewer
interprets the answers in the context of the aims of the research study but may not have
captured accurately what the interviewee meant. As Holloway and Jefferson (2000, p. 3)
put it: If we are prepared to disagree, modify, select and interpret what they tell us, is this not an
example of the kind of power that we, as researchers, have that should be kept in check by
being faithful to the voices of those who we are researching?
In similar vein, Alvesson (2003) warns that interviewers who believe that the
data gained through interviewee responses simply reveal reality are being romantic and
naïve. In his view interviewees usually try to interpret what the interviewers are after
and give them what they think is expected. He believes that they are also influenced by
factors that are irrelevant to the questions, such as the age, gender or ethnicity of the
interviewers, wanting to give a good impression to the interviewer and helping to create
or maintain a positive self-image. Interviewees may try to use the interview as a vehicle
for influencing management action. This past point is more likely to be relevant in
ethnographic studies than in interviewing people from a variety of organisations.
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With regard to some of the points made by Alvesson (2003), I was aware that
what interviewees were saying would not be ‘verified’ by seeking others’ perceptions.
Interviews conducted with one person in an organisation cannot be taken to be the only
reality. Not only can different types of change player (for example, change leaders and
change recipients) construct the reality of change differently, so too can different
people within the same category. My own personal experience of organisational change
- and other organisational issues - is that there are many constructions of events and
each individual’s ‘reality’ is somewhat or vastly different to others. The main point of
the interviews was to gain insight into how individuals perceived situations and how
this led to emotional reactions.
I found interviewees were not always able to articulate their views or their
feelings. How then can it be said that what appears on a transcript is always
‘negotiated’? Even if interviewees are given an opportunity to view and suggest
amendments to a transcript (which is what I offered) some may not be motivated to do
so (and none of mine made any substantive amendments). Secondly, it is the researcher
who selects material from a number of transcripts for the data analysis and the way in
which the interviews are written up are the writer’s construction of the conversations.
This is not negotiated with interviewees. Ideally researchers should present their
analysis of interview data to the interviewees and seek their comments on the
presentation of their unique responses. However, this is time consuming and may be
impractical and inconsistent if all respondents cannot be tracked down or do not
respond. Interviewees are unlikely to read the whole research report and it becomes a
major task to identify those parts that refer specifically to an individual respondent and
multiply this by the number of respondents. Qualitative researchers are both producers
and consumers of empirical studies and rely on the competence and integrity of fellow
researchers while still questioning, as they tend to do with regard their own respondents,
whether the researcher has really ‘got it right’.
Clearly, the aims of the researcher influence the nature of the questions, the
ways in which answers are elicited and the ways in which the data is interpreted. This
thesis explicitly explores, inter alia, emotional responses to change. The aim was to
allow the participants to describe their reactions to change but the nature of the
questions was inevitably based on the constructs I believe are useful in shedding light
on change experiences.
In the first draft of the methodology section I took on board the caveat against
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the use of leading questions since they can be seen as manipulating the interviewee
(Arksey & Knight, 1999) and delivering a distortion of the ‘truth’. However, in the
interviews, if I sensed that what I was digging for was there but had not been unearthed,
I resorted at times to asking leading questions. The purpose of asking leading questions,
which in most cases I was aware I was doing, was to clarify what the participants may
have been struggling to articulate, or may not have considered, or contradicted what
they had said before. I consciously asked several participants the question, “I may be
putting an answer in your mouth, but would it be fair to say that you felt...?” I was
assured on each occasion that this was indeed the emotion experienced.
3.5 Ethical issues
Referring to ethical dimensions of qualitative research, Punch (1998, p. 168) points out
that “In essence, most concern revolves around issues of harm, consent, deception,
privacy, and confidentiality of data.”
A number of these ethical concerns arose during the research process for this
thesis. Lee (1993, p. 103) acknowledges that in talking about sensitive topics
respondents “may be asked to reveal a great deal about themselves, perhaps at some
emotional cost.” It is almost tautologous to state that discussing emotional experience is
itself an emotional experience. Emotional reactions to change are often personal, private
and sensitive. Interviewing people on sensitive subjects may be stressful for both the
interviewer and the interviewee (Brannen, 1988). If, as many authors suggest (e.g.
Smollan, 2006c; Fineman, 2003; Ashforth & Humphrey, 1995), emotional expression is
generally not acceptable in organisations, or in broader aspects of life, talking about
emotions to a researcher may be an emotional experience in itself. In interviewing
subjects on emotion and injustice in organisations, Harlos and Pinder (2000) report that
the nature of the experiences being discussed triggered strong emotional reactions
during the interview - in both interviewer and interviewees. Warren (2002) also notes
the emotional costs for the interviewee and interviewer of some types of interviews.
Patton (1990, p. 315) warns of the need to mask interviewer emotions and refrain from
conveying judgement, “I cannot be shocked, I cannot be angered, I cannot be
embarrassed, I cannot be saddened.” In reflecting on the methodology he used for his
doctoral study on emotions and organisational change, Poder (2004) admitted that in
one interview he felt insecure and uncomfortable when an interviewee was expressing
emotions and that this affected how he conducted that interview. Reporting on her
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experience in interviewing, A. Clarke (2006) was hesitant to probe when she sensed it
was inappropriate but also indicated that she was not always sure whether this was
necessary or not. Some of her interviewees spoke in matter-of-fact ways about very
emotional issues.
A very different approach is taken by Gubrium and Holstein (1997) and Ellis
(1991) who call for what they respectively term ‘emotionalism’ and ‘emotional
sociology’, which encourage researchers, in appropriate ways, to respond to the
emotions of their subjects by sharing their own views, and their own emotions, so as to
elicit, record and understand the emotional experience of both. I mostly avoided this
approach but did show empathy and in a few cases admitted that I had experienced a
similar situation.
When a participant releases emotion during an interview the interviewer needs
both the sensitivity and skill to be able to respond appropriately so that harm is not
unintentionally caused (A. Clarke, 2006). Brannen (1988) points out that interviews on
sensitive issues can leave the interviewee vulnerable to three parties - the interviewee
(who will re-engage in a potentially emotional issue), other people (including those
from the same community or organisation), and the interviewer (who may exploit the
interviewee). On the other hand, she also cautions researchers to be aware of the urge to
‘help’ the interviewee deal with the potentially stressful encounter. She recommends
that researchers, who themselves may find the dynamics of the interview, and the
material divulged, to be stressful, to seek their own forms of support, collegial and if
necessary, professional. Arksey and Knight’s (1999) guidelines on dealing with the
emotional displays of participants were also followed. My participants were offered a
list of counselling agencies should they need professional help. In retrospect, the
interviews did not seem to be overly emotional experiences for the respondents. Some
of them got quite heated, particularly in recalling injustice, others admitted a degree of
embarrassment or shame in the way they had acted, but none showed stress in the
interview, although they might have done so when the changes had actually occurred.
Guba and Lincoln (1998) argue that ethics is intrinsic to a constructivist
paradigm and warn of problems that may arise around matters of confidentiality and
anonymity. Lee (1993), however, provides detailed guidelines on how confidentiality
can be maintained so that readers are unable to discern the identities of the respondents
or their employers. In describing the participants in this study I have striven to conceal
their identities and those of their organisations. Clearly it is up to the researcher to
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anticipate ethical issues and manage both expected and unexpected issues when they
arise. In addition, before commencing the interviews, I completed the university’s ethics
application form in which I had to predict the types of issues that might arise and build
in mechanisms to deal with them.
While dealing with qualitative information is a significant ethical concern there
are other phases of the research process that need careful thought (Kvale, 1996; Lee,
1993). Interview questions need to be designed that will provide answers to the research
questions. However, the questions have the potential to provoke embarrassment, shame
and other emotions. While semi-structured interviews provide an opportunity for
researchers into change to explore responses in some depth, caution needs to be
exercised in delving into areas that may prove stressful for the interviewees.
3.6 Evaluating a Qualitative Study
Authors have pointed to the different lenses which researchers using various paradigms
wear to evaluate the quality of any research study. Positivist approaches to data analysis
are based on issues validity, reliability and objectivity or generalisability (Denzin &
Lincoln, 1994; Easterby-Smith et al., 2002). Parallels in qualitative research are
considered by Lincoln and Guba (1985) and Lincoln (1995) to be credibility,
transferability, dependability and confirmability. Cresswell (1998) suggests that
verification is a more appropriate concept than validity, even though the term means to
prove or check the truth of something. People reporting on experience may provide
verification of a theorised relationship, for example, anger resulting from injustice.
However, some researchers use the same language for qualitative research that is
commonly used in quantitative research. For example, validity is essentially a concept
from a positivist paradigm (Kvale, 1996; Mason, 2002) that researchers need to prove or
demonstrate what they set out to do. Constructionists, according to Easterby-Smith et al.
(2002, p. 53), ask the question, “Does the study clearly gain access to the experiences of
those in the research setting.” Miles and Huberman (1994, p. 11) assert that qualitative
data analysis necessarily involves drawing conclusions and that “The meanings
emerging from the data have to be tested for their plausibility, their sturdiness, their
‘confirmability’ - that is their validity” [authors’ emphasis]. Grbich (2004, p. 53) takes
the view that post-modern and post-structural approaches to validity have resulted in a
shift from: a focus on accuracy of measurement of the defined area (quantitative) or a demonstration of
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the attainment of truth of the matter (qualitative) and now lies in a move away from defined
criteria with no pretence of outcomes of prediction or generalisability.
Hyde (2002), however, believes that one of the goals of the qualitative researcher is to
expand on and generalise theories, but not to predict the frequency of a phenomenon.
In an interview context validity “means whether the interview study investigates
what is intended to be investigated” (Kvale, 1996, p. 88). I am satisfied that the answers
I obtained helped me develop a good understanding of the emotions people experienced
during change, and what their causes and consequences were. The qualitative
equivalents of validity are plausibility (Miles & Huberman, 1994) or credibility
(Lincloln & Guba, 1995) and the responses of participants in my study did appear to fit
these terms. In one case, however, I questioned, privately and then openly, one
participant’s contention that a change for him was not an emotional experience, because
at various times in the interview he had used terms such as excitement, passion, stress,
comfort and enjoyment.
Seidman (2006, p. 24) prefers to interview people three times over a maximum
of three weeks, which, he believes, helps to enhance validity by getting participants to
“account for idiosyncratic ways and to check on the internal consistency of what they
say.” While this may be a useful approach it is not always practical; it demands the time
of both interviewer and interviewee. I was aware that in 60 to 90 minutes I could not
explore every research question in depth and that more interviews could provide extra
depth. I was also conscious that re-interviewing people to gain deeper insight into some
of the responses, or to clarify certain aspects, would have provided very useful
information. However, I stuck to the one-off formula and the internal consistency that
Seidman, (2006) refers to was at times checked spontaneously during the course of the
interviews.
Reliability is traditionally taken to mean that a person will produce the same
answers regardless of when he or she is asked (Holstein & Gubrium, 2004). Kvale
(1996), however, uses the terms reliability and validity under the umbrella of
verification. Interviews, especially those done in different organisations, provide insight
into personal experience, and illuminate the perceived antecedents and consequences of
various change events. For example, interviews on change will not produce ‘proof’ that
injustice causes anger, but will verify that some people did feel anger because of some
aspects of change outcomes or processes. Holstein and Gubrium (2004) comment that a
quantitative concept of reliability means that the same answers will be produced on
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different occasions, but that in a qualitative framework one cannot expect this
consistency since the circumstances may vary. For example, it is likely that when
interviewed on change a person’s mood on one day may be somewhat different to that
on another day. These moods could influence the emotions and moods they recall
experiencing in the context of the change (Sakaki, 2007). Reliability in a qualitative
enquiry, according to Mason (2002), means that the researcher strives for thoroughness,
carefulness, honesty and accuracy, and according to Knight (2002), it means
consistency in the way interviews are conducted. From a constructionist perspective,
Easterby-Smith et al. (2002) consider it to represent the transparency in how sense was
made of the data.
In determining generalisability Easterby-Smith et al. (2002, p. 30) ask, “Do the
concepts and constructs derived from this study have any relevance to other settings?”
Mason (2002) provides a detailed examination of how researchers can argue their case
for generalisability of their findings. She suggests that the strongest approach is one
which rigorously provides comparisons from different contexts and which “uses rather
than glosses over specificity and difference” (p. 197). Appropriate comparison of
empirical qualitative material to similar data gathered by other researchers lends weight
to claims of generalisability.
While the data from interviews with a relatively small number of people (24 in
my study) do not encourage me to make a strong claim to generalisability, it is
reasonable to suggest that, using Easterby-Smith et al.’s (2002) concept, one could say,
for example, that if a phenomenon like restructuring is identified by two-thirds of my
respondents as producing strong emotional reactions, the findings could be termed
generalisable. However in doing so one is playing the game by quantitative rules.
Individual readers may take differing positions on how generalisable one
isolated response may be. However, an important point is that an
interpretivist/constructionist approach to research can uncover how individuals
experienced a phenomenon (such as an organisational change) and what underpinned
the experience, rather than speculating on how most others might have reacted. A
person may have had a reaction to an event that others may not have had but this is not
an indictment of the research process. Rather it would be revelation of a unique reaction
to an experience. People do not react to events in identical ways and one of the lessons
practitioners (and academics) could learn from reading idiographic accounts of
organisational change is that people cannot be predicted to act in the same ways and that
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idiosyncratic reactions may realistically be expected.
To conclude the methodology section, I was pleased that the interviews yielded
a wealth of useful material that would allow me to analyse the participants’ affective
responses to change, and their cognitive antecedents and behavioural outcomes. I
appreciated their willingness to discuss personal issues, especially those they found
particularly difficult. The social constructionist approach to analysing interview data
confirmed that individual responses to organisational change are in many ways moulded
by the social forces that participants experience at work and in other aspects of their
lives.
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CHAPTER 4: FINDINGS – THE DEDUCTIVE PHASE
4.1 Introduction
The broad aims of this study are to investigate the impact of emotion on the experience
of change at the individual level, to examine these experiences from the perspectives of
people who play different change-related roles, to identify the causes and consequences
of emotional responses, and to explore the strategies individuals use to cope with the
change events and the ensuing emotions.
The findings and discussion are presented in two parts. In this chapter I analyse
responses to the 13 research questions, drawn deductively from the literature and the
resultant model, and which deal with the factors that were theorised to impact on
responses to change. Given the focus on resistance in much of the change literature a
special section will be devoted to it at the end of this section. In the next chapter I move
into inductive analysis to examine other factors that emerged in the interviews.
4.2 Method of Analysis
Data is a term that has been shown to have many different meanings (Thomas, 2006). In
quantitative studies it is, by definition, conceptualised in numerical terms. In qualitative
terms, however, “data are categorized and examined for patterns and themes that can be
integrated into narrative accounts” (Thomas, 2006, p. 91). The approach to analysis in
this study allowed for individual experiences to be given voice and a comparison of
different responses to be made.
The interviews were transcribed by third parties and a number of steps were
taken to develop a framework for interpreting the comments of the respondents. In the
first step I listened to the tapes while reading the transcripts to ensure their accuracy. In
the second step seven headings were inserted into the transcripts to group the interview
questions into the 13 research questions, derived from the literature review, and
embedded in the model. For example, interview questions 1 to 8 were on the type of
change, outcomes and scale (Research Questions 1 and 2), 9 to14 were on temporal
issues (Research Question 3), 15 to 22 on justice (Research Question 4), and so on.
In the third step tables were drawn up that were based on the seven headings.
The tables captured key points made by each participant or quotes by them. This
allowed for an easy form of open coding (Cresswell, 1998). Coding was done at
different levels. For example, outcomes were coded as favourable and unfavourable,
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and for self and others. Similarly, four separate categories of organisational justice and
three temporal dimensions of change were described in the literature review and
responses were coded accordingly. In addition, on many occasions, when answering one
question, participants referred to a construct covered in another question. For example,
when discussing the nature of leadership a participant would raise the influence of
organisational culture. Comments like this were noted in two (or more) of the relevant
tables. Coding also allowed for concepts not directly embraced in the interview
questions. For example, no questions were asked that specifically related to changes to
the psychological contract. However, some respondents’ answers revealed issues with
regard to changes to perceived mutual obligations of employer and employee and these
were linked to perceptions of fairness.
A fourth step was taken with the creation of another level of coding. For
example, in the first table the types of change were coded in terms of Porras and
Robertson’s (1992) framework of characteristics of the work setting, or the targets of
change (see Table 4 in the literature review). The purpose of this analysis was to
ascertain whether the changes covered a range of situations and this was the case. Given
that one change (such as a restructure) could trigger several other types of change, the
number of types of change adds up to more than 24. There were 24 references to
Organizing Arrangements, 17 to Social Factors, 6 to Physical Setting and 13 to
Technology. Some of the interviews focused on one particular type of change but the
participants may also have made passing reference to other types of change. Since
interviewees selected different aspects of an organisational change, a detailed analysis
of the 23 sub-categories in the Porras and Robertson model proved elusive and of
questionable value in terms of understanding the affective responses to the changes. For
example, one participant moved to a similar role in a company that had taken over his
division of his original employer and relocated the manufacturing facility. This
indicates that just about every sub-category in the model had changed, but not all were
discussed during the interview. Nevertheless every one of the 23 sub-categories were
discussed by at least one respondent. Of particular note, however, was the high number
(22) of organisational restructurings that were reported on, with an attendant impact on
job redesign. Interestingly, Porras and Robertson classify Formal Structure under
Organizing Arrangements, and Job Design under Technology. Six participants were
made redundant and 10 reported on the redundancies of others. It is likely that these
more dramatic forms of change were the subject of the interview since they had made a
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strong impression on the interviewees.
The fifth step of data analysis was the listing of the observation of key
points that emerged from the analysis of the table. These would serve as the starting
point for the writing up of the findings. The tables of data analysis are included in
Appendix 3. They are essentially rough notes, quotes and observations.
The sixth step took place when I presented the supervisors of this thesis with
copies of the sections of the transcripts that dealt with one of the research questions (on
the temporal dimensions of change) and a table highlighting key responses from each of
the respondents. We met to discuss the structure of the table and the themes that had
emerged. This discursive process produced a conference paper (Smollan et al., 2007)
and presented me with alternative methods of analysing the data and alternative
interpretations of the respondent comments. While the joint process was not repeated,
the lessons I learned were applied to the analysis of the other 12 research questions and
the inductive research process. Therefore the seventh step took place when all seven
tables had been drawn up, analysed and compared, so that key overarching themes and
issues could be identified. These are reported in depth in both the deductive and
inductive analyses of the data.
For the purposes of reporting responses the 24 participants are coded from A to
Y (excluding I).
4.3 Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural Responses to Organisational Change
It can be stated unequivocally that organisational change is an emotional event, with all
24 respondents reporting on affective reactions to various aspects of one change or a
series of related changes. The emotions were elicited by cognitive processes as the
respondents tried to make sense of the changes and assess how they would affect
themselves and others. Most participants were able to regulate their emotions, or at least
modify their emotional expression and other behavioural responses, but some did regret
the nature of their actions and reflected that they wished they had acted differently. This
aspect of the model was therefore confirmed and supports the cognitive appraisal
theories of Lazarus (1991, 1993, 1999) and Scherer (1999) that appraisal of situations
triggers emotion as people consider their wellbeing and how to cope with the situations.
What follows now is a detailed reporting of how each of the 13 factors in the
model contributed to cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to organisational
change. The first set of variables are those directly relating to the change itself, followed
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by factors in the individual, perceived factors relating to leaders and managers of
change and factors in the organisation.
Variables Mediating Cognitive Responses to Change
Perceived Favourability of Outcomes of Change
Research Question 1a: How does perceived favourability of the outcomes of
change mediate cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 1b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
In the literature review outcomes of change were categorised in terms of their nature,
timeframe and focus by individuals on themselves and other stakeholders. With
reference to these concepts outcomes are evaluated by people involved in organisational
change as favourable (positive), unfavourable (negative), a combination of the two
(mixed or ambivalent), or neither, and these cognitive responses are accompanied by
affective responses.
In the first category, the nature of change, participants in this research study
generally noted a combination of favourable and unfavourable outcomes. With
reference to positive material outcomes, L experienced pride and relief on finally
winning a role she had to contest with another employee, O was content to obtain a new
job while also receiving redundancy pay and F was pleased to move to a new career
within the company. Participants were disappointed or distressed with negative material
outcomes. For example, C was allocated a shabby office, B was given remuneration that
was not commensurate with the new project she was undertaking, and at times dealt
with an unmanageable workload, D and K were made redundant and V was suspended
and later fired. These losses were particularly difficult to manage on an emotional level.
Regarding the non-material outcomes, E and R, who were senior human
resource managers, reported that being involved in a major change delivered favourable
outcomes of better relationships, higher credibility and more influence. Conversely, A, a
senior manager, felt “disenfranchised” by the change since he had not been consulted,
as would have been the case in the past, and P, also a senior manager, was likewise
angry and frustrated when she and colleagues were rarely consulted in a takeover. H felt
humiliated in a takeover by being relegated from a general management position, and
subsequently excluded from board meetings and some social functions. Fairness issues,
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which will be pursued in more depth in research Question 4, can be as much about
material as non-material outcomes.
The second category of outcomes relates to timeframes and was very relevant to
some participants. Most noted a combination of both positive and negative outcomes
but the ramifications often only became apparent over time. For example, B initially
found involvement in a restructuring a good career opportunity and was very
“energised”, but also reported that the demands of the process “pushed me to the point
where I broke and it changed my life”. The demands included a huge interim workload
and difficult interactions with staff in the absence of managerial support. Conversely, D
was distressed and shocked at suddenly being made redundant but in retrospect found
that it helped kick-start a new career. Similarly, F found the transition phase of a
restructuring exercise “bloody horrible”, partly due to the uncertainty as to his future
role, but was pleased to move to a completely different department and a change in
career direction. L also had to ride out a long and “dark” period of uncertainty regarding
her role but felt proud that she had emerged from the period with an enhanced position
and reputation. V had to wait more than two years before he won a court case about his
dismissal. In most of the above situations the respondents were change recipients, even
those in management positions. In Research Question 3 I deal in detail with the impact
of temporal issues of organisational change but it should be briefly noted here that the
outcomes of change might be known to employees or uncertain. Over time, as the
outcomes are clarified, and the implications are manifested, the cognitive and emotional
responses may change.
In the third category, participants were asked to describe outcomes for
themselves and others and comment on their favourability. Those who did well out of
the change, such as by gaining improved roles or enhanced reputations, commented on
how pleased and proud they were. Those who were disadvantaged by the change were
naturally negative. Participants’ emotional reactions were also evident when appraising
the consequences for others but these reactions were generally more muted and took the
form of concern. Those who had managed redundancies were acutely aware of the
consequences for those who were laid off and described the negative affective reactions
of the victims as shock, grief, anger, stress and anxiety. As Q admitted about the
outcomes of restructuring, job design and redundancies, “We had to hurt people to
achieve it.” These change leaders and managers seemed to have more of an emotional
investment when they could make an impact on others’ outcomes. G and P expressed
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pride that they had staged processes that were ethical and produced no personal
grievances and G was particularly pleased when victims praised the way he had acted.
Some, like E and M, spoke of embarrassment when aspects of a process had been
poorly handled by others.
Affection and concern for others are altruistic emotions but also have
implications for the wellbeing of both parties to a relationship. For example, people who
had managed downsizing, such as E and N, were very concerned about the impact on
victims. L was put in the invidious position of having to spend several years duelling for
a senior role with a colleague who finally left. In addition to her own anxiety, and anger
at having been put in this situation, she also demonstrated real consideration for the
feelings of the other person and for the loss of the relationship which they had
previously developed. O, who negotiated her own early redundancy prior to probably
being laid off, spoke of the anger she felt when team mates were not being shown due
concern and were expressing signs of stress.
People also compare themselves to others. The negative emotions of envy and
anger can arise when others have gained and the individual has lost something because
of a change, while guilt occurs when one has been advantaged and others not,
particularly if fairness concerns play a role. W managed a restructure and redundancy
process and reported that some people, unjustifiably in his opinion, thought they were
being victimised, particularly when new people with different types of skill were being
recruited. When H was relegated from a general management position after an
ownership change, she was dismayed when told to report to someone new, who for a
short time had reported to her and who had considerably less industry experience.
Positive emotions such as pride and happiness can also result when one has favourable
outcomes despite unfair procedures that could have benefited others. The potential
outcomes for F and L, referred to above, forced them to compare themselves with others
who were line for the same position. L felt relief and pride, and even spoke of elation, at
obtaining the job when the rival left before management had made its decision, but also
expressed empathy for the rival’s situation. F was pleased and relieved to have
negotiated redeployment before management made a decision on the best candidate for
the redesigned role.
Participants also commented on the favourability of outcomes for stakeholders
other than their subordinates or peers, such as for their own immediate supervisors - “it
was the one secret pleasure I got out of seeing him uncomfortable over it” (D); senior
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management in general - “they wanted to get rid of a lot of people” (B); the organisation
itself - “the results are starting to show that we did the right thing” (S); new owners -
“they had an inside man in the business” (H), and external stakeholders - V wanted to
let external stakeholders of a community-based organisation know what impact a
restructuring of his organisation might have on them. Emotions expressed related to the
specifics of the situation and while some participants sounded very bitter, others were
reasonably neutral or proud if they had achieved positive outcomes for others.
Summary of findings and discussion
The nature of change-related outcomes, in the short-, medium- and long-term, for self
and others, unleashed a range of positive and negative reactions, cognitive and affective.
The nature of the comments of respondents supports the findings of other research
studies that the perceived favourability of the outcomes of change contributes
substantially to emotional reactions (e.g. Kiefer, 2002b; Matheny & Smollan, 2005).
Findings in the three categories of outcomes also confirm many of the results of
previous research.
In the first category, the nature of the outcomes, both the material and non-
material were important to the respondents. In researching the psychological contract
Lester and Kickul (2001) found that eight of the ten most important outcomes to
employees were material or intrinsic, such as opportunities to promotion and
advancement, trust and respect, open and honest communication and fair treatment. But
regardless of ranking, Kickul et al. (2002) found that contract breach during radical
change produced negative behavioural responses to both types of outcomes.
Many of my participants negative emotions arose from a feeling of loss, both in
material and non-material terms. Wolfram Cox (1997) showed how loss in factory staff
undergoing change evoked resentment, sadness and gloom. In the current study, while
the loss of participants’ jobs through redundancy or dismissal was the most potent form,
loss of power, status and authority were also triggers of negative emotions, as they
contributed to a sense of erosion of self-identity, consequences suggested in the
conceptual work of Fineman (2003) and Carr (1999). Loss can be the start of a grieving
process that evolves through a variety of emotions (Kübler-Ross, 1969) as people come
to terms with the implications of the change.
In the second category of change outcomes (timeframes), as the implications
became more manifest over the duration of the change, cognitive, affective and
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behavioural responses varied. Isabella’s (1990) empirical study indicates the various
sense making processes people engage in when coming to terms with change as it
unfolds. The current study also reinforces the affective responses. A number of my
participants used Kübler-Ross’ (1969) term grief cycle, or the words anger, shock and
denial that are included in it. The phases of the emotional rollercoaster effect depicted in
the various models of change reported by Elrod and Tippett (2000) partly reflect the
phases of change - anticipation, announcement, planning, implementation and
aftermath.
The third category of change refers to the separation of outcomes for self and
others. Lau and Woodman (1995) found that a proposed change was viewed by
employees in terms of how it would affect their jobs, rather than on how it would affect
the organisation. Vince (2006) found a similar reaction to an organisational change (a
takeover) in senior and middle managers and the affective responses were more intense
for participants’ own outcomes both in his research and the current study. Cognitive
approaches to the study of emotion (e.g. Frijda, 1988; Lazarus, 1991) note that the
significance of an event for an individual is a predictor of the intensity of the emotional
response. However, some participants did admit to strong emotions when dealing with
others’ negative outcomes such as downsizing. This mirrors the reported reactions of
managers of downsizing who found the exercise extremely draining but who also
empathised with the victims (Clair & Dufresne, 2004; Gandolfi, 2008). When the
outcomes for oneself can only be achieved at the expense of others, or vice versa,
emotions of guilt, pride, jealousy and envy occur. In having to contest a role with
another, L encountered both positive and negative emotions till she finally won the
position. Her mixed emotions were related partly to the outcomes, partly to the
perceived injustice of the process. The relationships between emotions, outcomes and
justice were demonstrated in an experimental study by Cropanzano et al. (2000). In one
of the earliest theories of distributive justice, Adams (1965) makes the point that people
frequently compare themselves to others and respond on cognitive, affective and
behavioural levels. Justice issues will be reported in more depth in Research Question 4.
In conclusion, the results of the current study indicate that various aspects of
employee outcomes contribute to employee responses and some become more salient
during change processes. An additional key point that emerged from the findings was
that where people were leading or managing change they had greater control over their
own outcomes and were therefore more pleased with what eventuated. Conversely,
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when change was imposed it tended to produce poorer material and non-material
outcomes, such as a less challenging job and a deflated sense of self.
Perceived Scale of the Change
Research Question 2a: How do perceptions of the scale of change mediate
cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 2b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
Many of the participants in this study considered the changes they experienced as large-
scale and used terms like big, significant, massive, huge and even “life-changing”. In
some cases they were referring to the change for themselves, some for other people and
some for the organisation. Several participants reported on restructuring, a number of
which resulted in redundancies affecting a sizeable number of people. Some reflected
on changing corporate strategies such as takeovers and mergers, or changes in
functional strategies, such as in distribution or human resources, that affected many
employees. These types of change are bound to be viewed as large in scale because of
the significance of the outcomes or the wide scope of those affected. When major
change occurs for a number of parties the emotional stakes are raised. W noted he had
to simultaneously manage three significant change initiatives in different parts of the
business. While this represented an interesting personal challenge, it was also a sizeable
one, and he also knew that some of the staff would find the change threatening,
particularly those who had already experienced considerable change in the past (an issue
explored in Research Question 3).
A common theme was detected in the nature of the emotional reactions to the
size of the change - they were stronger when individual outcomes were considered.
These impacts (which were noted in the findings for Research Question 1, favourability
of outcomes) had longer-term considerations, such as the perceived nature of the role,
and shorter-term considerations, such as the extra effort that would be required in the
process of change implementation.
A few respondents acknowledged that the change was big for the organisation
but had little impact on their own jobs. U, for example, was a sales assistant in a retail
organisation that merged with another, but since her job and working conditions were
substantially unaffected, she experienced very little emotion, particularly when it had
been announced very early in the process that there would be no redundancies and
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minimal change at the operational level. But she did assert, “They didn’t pay attention
to how we feel, because they just paid attention to the big things and not the small
things.” Some leaders and managers of change acknowledged that strategic changes
were significant at the organisational level, and had major implications for individuals
or groups of people, but little impact on themselves, apart from the extra effort
necessary in managing the change process. Curiously, even C, who moved to new
premises when his division was taken over by another company, and was disappointed
that his job (perhaps temporarily) had less challenge, said that the change was not that
big since the product range and manufacturing processes were the same. In contrast,
some interviewees acknowledged that the change was big for them but not for the
organisation. J, for example, said that a change in a pricing approach, on the face of it a
minor change, was a big change since it created significant difficulties for the
department he managed.
Change of a substantial nature requires a process of sense-making as individuals
tend to review and revise existing schemata. R encountered considerable resistance to
change from partners in a professional services firm which moved to a more
conventional corporate model and which then introduced a series of changes that
dramatically changed other aspects of its culture. In K’s organisation employees in
some roles had to either take the role of contract consultants or face redundancy.
The scale of the change triggered intense emotions for some participants. V was
suspended, then dismissed, and two years later won a court case for unfair dismissal. He
used a large number of negative emotion words in recalling the experience - sad,
gloomy, angry, hopeless, pain, heartache and anguish. Redundancy, a big change for
anybody who is laid off, can naturally produce a strong sense of loss, accompanied by
anger at the outcome and/or process, and anxiety about future employment. D spoke of
shock, distress and betrayal at the announcement of immediate redundancy. The term
uncertainty was used by most of those involved in downsizing, be they managers of the
process, the victims or the survivors, and was strongly associated with anxiety. O said
the process was stressful for her and traumatic for others. K reflected that it had a huge
impact, it gets “you out of your comfort zone…What do you do with your life?” and
spoke of the anxiety of meeting family commitments, such as paying the mortgage.
Given that the names of victims of redundancy are often not known for some time, and
this was the case for some of the participants, their emotions moved from anxiety to
anger, sadness or surprise. Survivors experienced anxiety then relief, but also sadness
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for those leaving and sometimes anger at management. Those managing redundancies
also experienced negative emotions, particularly regret and sadness. As E recalled, “I
have never been so exhausted in my entire life and so depressed, because we had
shattered so many lives.”
The intensity of the emotion is also related to the extent people think they can
cope with the change. While a more detailed treatment of this concept will be explored
later in this chapter (Research Question 6 - disposition, and Research Question 7 -
previous experience of change) it seems logical that the larger the change the more
chance there is that people may think they cannot meet the challenges required, and feel
a sense of inadequacy and anxiety. B was stressed by the overload of time and
responsibility and the abuse she had to deal with and felt she was “drowning”. Change
self-efficacy plays a role in the cognitive and affective responses to the size of the
change. R, who managed a series of transformational changes involving structure,
culture, remuneration and performance management, spoke on the one hand of the
inspiration and excitement from managing the change, and on the other of the “shock
and horror” of having “so many balls in the air” and the anxiety that one would drop.
Despite the pressure she was confident she could cope. Most respondents who were
change leaders or managers reported being confident that they could deal with the
requirements of change.
Summary of findings and discussion
A wide range of factors therefore contributes to perceptions of the scale of a change and
the adjustment that is required. Firstly, the size of the change was viewed by a number
of participants in terms of its personal impact. In the previous research question on
change outcomes it was noted that personal outcomes are usually viewed as more
meaningful than those for other staff or the organisation and this also applies to
perceptions of scale.
The literature on sense-making and change, which is substantially about
cognitive processes, describes the need of individuals to review and revise existing
schemata (Lau & Woodman, 1995; George & Jones, 2001). Change theorists have used
the term third-order change (Bartunek & Moch, 1987) and gamma change
(Golembiewski et al., 1975; Porras & Silvers, 1991) to capture the nature of radical
change where the schemata themselves are changing. An illustration of this is R’s
account of the difficulties of partners of a professional services firm during its transition
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to a corporate decision-making approach. On a smaller scale, but one that was
nevertheless big for those involved, police officers in Collerette et al.’s (2006) research
reported that an information technology change was seen as large scale because of the
need to acquire new skills and make adjustments to the way in which some of the work
was done. The negative reactions to downsizing of participants in this study are similar
to those reported in other studies (e.g. Ryan & Macky, 1998; Paterson & Cary, 2002;
Barclay et al., 2005) as people struggle to come to terms with a major loss.
Secondly, the emotional responses to radical change that were reported by
participants in the current study confirm the findings of Huy (2002), Mossholder et al.
(2000) and Robinson and Griffiths (2005) that radical change, partly because of its
unpredictability, has strong affective overtones, mostly negative. In her study of a
merger Kiefer (2002b) found a number of reasons for negative emotions. Employees
experienced frustration when some element of the change went wrong, anger over
increased workloads and anxiety about possible redundancies and coping with new
demands.
Thirdly, other factors also play a role in participant responses to the size of a
change. For some employees in the current study their cognitive and affective responses
to large scale change were also influenced by dispositional factors, such as change self-
efficacy, locus of control and optimism. Previous research (e.g. Jimmieson et al., 2004;
Caldwell et al., 2004; Wanberg & Banas, 2000) has shown how these factors can impact
on cognitive responses to large scale change, but has not specifically addressed the
affective responses. This will be dealt with in this study more fully in Research
Question 6. The scale of a change can also be seen, as in the case of R, to be a series of
ongoing changes, which will be analysed in Research Question 7, previous experience
of change. Continuing change adds to the perception of a large-scale change that could
potentially lead to stress, burnout and resistance as Kiefer (2005) and Halbesleben and
Buckley (2004) have reported.
It is therefore helpful now to look at how the temporal dimensions of change,
namely frequency, timing and speed, trigger cognitive evaluations and affective
reactions.
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The Perceived Frequency, Timing and Speed of the Change
Research Question 3a: How do aspects of frequency, timing and speed of
change mediate cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 3b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
Frequency, speed and timing are three discrete dimensions of organisational change but
can overlap (for example, introducing an additional change too quickly can embrace all
three) and combine to influence cognitive and affective responses.
The frequency of the change
Several participants had experienced a number of work-related changes over time. The
ongoing changes led by R, and her positive and negative emotional reactions, were
detailed in Research Question 2. W, also a senior manager, anticipated that a
restructuring would be unpleasant for many staff. Not only would some of the outcomes
be difficult to accept but this development also followed other changes that had
occurred. S felt excitement in the management of regular change but did not experience
negative emotions. Nevertheless, mostly negative emotions surfaced in participants
dealing with ongoing change. C spoke of “quantum changes in owners and the sense of
direction of the company”, and how this had affected his sense of job security. F
referred to his organisation as “change weary” and “punch drunk” from a history of
changes, but did not admit to negative emotions of his own. Similarly, N, who was
brought in at senior level to oversee a major change, commented: I’ve seen a couple of people in the last few months elect to leave the business because of
the degree of change and they’ve said that the reason why they’ve left is that there’s been
too much change in this organisation over a period of time. And some of these
people…have been in roles for 10 or 15 years [and are]…brow beaten. Change is cool,
we all accept that, but it’s the frequency and the degree of it, and that degree of
uncertainty…[that have] a significant emotional impact on people.
Some believed that ongoing change was normal, evidenced by P’s contention
that “this sector is used to change…we take it as part of the game.”
The timing of the change
Only a few participants identified timing of the change, or a phase of it, as an issue
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either for themselves or others. E commented that it is difficult to identify the right time
for a change but that people do get more weary towards the end of the year. However,
the change was completed just before Christmas but did not have much emotional
impact on himself or others. U, a retail assistant, found that the timing of a merger was
good because although it had been completed just before Christmas little change would
take place at the operational level where she worked and because all staff were able to
process the change before a very busy period.
In managing redundancies a factor that played some role was the timing of the
announcement of those who were to be laid off. G, a senior manager, believed that it
was unfair to lay off people by closing a branch just before Christmas but that the delay
in doing so meant that head office managers were put under extra pressure to balance
costs and revenues over a longer period than desirable. C, also a senior manager,
reflected that the timing of a relocation and retrenchment of staff done just before
Christmas undermined people’s enjoyment of the holiday season but enabled them to
save money and plan for the future. On a personal level the timing had little impact but
he ventured the opinion that it could not have come at a worse time for the business
itself. B was “absolutely furious” when an agreed schedule was changed at very short
notice by the CEO. Her anger was partly triggered by what she considered was an unfair
outcome, a huge extra workload she had to deal with immediately, and partly by the
perceived unfairness of a unilateral process.
The speed of the change
Respondents fell into four categories: those who thought the change was too fast, those
who believed it was too slow, those who thought that the pace was acceptable and those
who found it difficult to evaluate.
Change was considered too quick when it gave those affected too little time to
either do the work that was required, as in B’s case, or to adjust to the change on a
psychological level, as in U’s experience. The latter reported that when a company she
had worked for had been put into liquidation, staff had been extremely surprised to
come to work one day to find that locks had been put on the doors, when they had been
told that the process would take weeks longer. O, who was a change recipient, felt at the
end of a change that it was “freefall” and that she was powerless to do anything about it.
D, a professional, was shocked and angry when told that her division was being closed
and that she was to be made redundant with immediate effect. Having fought her
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employer over the date of her departure, which took several months, she commented, “I
cannot work out in my own mind, having gone through it, whether it’s better to have it
done quickly or consulted with and done slowly. I mean both are bad.” Similarly, V, a
non-manager, was surprised to be called into a staff meeting to hear that his job was to
be disestablished. He contacted various external stakeholders to inform them of
developments and was stunned when he was suspended the next day for this action.
Change was also considered too quick when it denied respondents the opportunity to
contribute to change decisions. A, a senior manager, felt “disenfranchised” that in a
restructuring process a division he had built up over many years was “gone in the blink
of an eye.”
Change was considered too slow by change leaders and managers who
experienced frustration that the plan was taking too long to be implemented, and that it
was taking too long for others to ‘get the picture’ and demonstrate the required
behaviours. W called it the “marathon effect”, a term he admitted he had read about,
(possibly in Bridges, 2003, p. 65). The frontrunners in large city marathons are well
down the road while others are still standing at the start, waiting for those in front of
them to give them space to move. Some change recipients were also affected by a slow
pace. People who anticipate bad news, such as in a redundancy, want finality and, if
need be, to start the process of job-hunting immediately or exploring other options. Q
remarked that some staff were saying, “Can you hurry up and make the decision and
give me the money, because I’ve already bought a business or I’m doing this or that.” V
was dismissed two months after his suspension but eventually won compensation in a
court case more than two years later. Of these last two phases he said: I just really wanted it to be over and after a two-year period there’s only so much
emotional hurt that you can go through and uncertainty and it was almost like closure,
just knowing that it was over and that I could move on. It was really, really, difficult
during that period of time.
One change manager suggested that “delay causes pain”, another that
“uncertainty can demoralise people”. One who was privy to certain information about a
change, felt guilty that he could not reveal it to those who would be affected by it, and
when he did confide in some of his colleagues he experienced some anxiety that this
could reach the ears of his fellow executives and be deemed a breach of confidence. A
few managers commented that some of their staff believed that change was too fast and
some believed that it was too slow, and that perceptions depended on the context of the
change or the personalities of the staff.
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Summary of findings and discussion
A number of important points on the three temporal dimensions of change emerge.
Firstly, people’s differing “prevailing temporal agendas” (Blount & Janicik, 2001, p.
570) influence how they cognitively and affectively react to change. Each person
construes organisational rhythms and routines from their own perspectives, in particular
how they impact on their own work. Change leaders, managers and agents may have
different temporal agendas to other stakeholders of the change and need to be aware of
this. W’s frustration that many staff, including middle management, took too long to
grasp the need for change was understandable, particularly since time had been invested
in explaining the importance of the change. Different agendas may be partly determined
by personality traits, which will be explored in more depth in Research Question 6. B,
for example, claimed that she liked fast change and other participants observed that they
were comfortable with change, even ongoing change. Nevertheless, when B’s CEO
changed the schedule of announcement of redundancies she became angry. Blount and
Janicik (2001) maintain that people dislike ‘hastenings’ (a concept involving both speed
and timing) if it negatively affects their work schedules. The increasing velocity of
change (Cameron, 2006) can, according to Leiter and Maslach (2001), contribute to
burnout. Nearly half of the respondents to a survey of nurses indicated that change took
place too quickly (Ball, 2006). While a fast change maintains momentum (Jansen, 2004)
and salience (Meyer & Stensaker, 2006), over a long period it can lead to change fatigue
(Meyer & Stensaker, 2006).
Secondly, temporal issues can be also be affected by other factors, such as
perceptions of leadership and justice. Of relevance here are the experiences of B and V
described above, and also those of F and L, who had to wait a long time to have the
nature of their roles confirmed. Riolli and Savicki’s (2006) study showed that when
members of a group had been given detailed information about the need for a rapid
change and the chance to raise questions, they experienced much less burnout than those
in the control group who had been given little information and no chance to participate.
They concluded that perceptions of procedural justice (to be covered in the next
research question) and leadership (Research Question 9) had a significant impact.
Thirdly, even though some people like change, handling too much of it can have
deleterious effects. Participants often noted the negative effects on others of ongoing
change but most seemed to be able to deal with it themselves. Rahe et al. (2000) found
that an accumulation of both positive and negative life changes, inside and outside
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work, could lead to stress. Frequency of organisational change has been found to cause
negative emotional responses and reduce acceptance of change (Woodward & Hendry,
2004; Kiefer, 2005; Rafferty & Griffin, 2006; Herold et al., 20076). Change weariness
was reported by a number of respondents in Connell and Waring’s (2002) research and
by Huy (2001) in his analysis of GE. There is a difference between change weariness
and the more extreme burnout, the latter evidenced by emotional exhaustion,
depersonalisation and reduced personal accomplishment (Maslach & Jackson, 1981). Of
the 24 participants, in the current study only B seemed to show signs of burnout, using
the phrases “pressure cooker finally bursting” and “I burnt out.” According to Russell
(1980) lay people often have a different understanding of psychological concepts, and
B’s story is an example of self-reported burnout. That said, it cannot be stated that
ongoing change by itself led to her burnout, but it did contribute to it. The major causes
in this case were a very heavy workload for a relatively inexperienced person who had
to manage a negative type of change, redundancies, with inadequate management
support, and who felt an overriding sense of injustice. This reinforces an earlier point
that other factors may be relevant.
Fourthly, a key issue that surfaced for many of the participants was the lack of
control over aspects of the change. Their dissatisfaction with some of the temporal
dimensions of change in many cases stemmed from their inability to control other
aspects of the change, not merely the frequency, pace or timing, and this was
exacerbated when they expected to have exerted more influence. Control over one’s life
is a powerful psychological driver for people (Rotter, 1990; Ashforth, 2001) and, when
denied, creates additional tensions.
Fifthly, a distinction needs to be made between individual reactions to changes
that take place over time and the reactions because of some element of time. With
regard to the former, reactions such as denial, anger and accommodation, which Elrod
and Tippett (2002) found in many rollercoaster models of change, could in many cases
occur regardless of the frequency, timing or speed of change.
Finally, heed should be taken of Huy’s (2001) advice that individuals’ inner or
subjective time become important when leaders and managers plan and implement
change. They need to take account of the type of change, previous or concurrent
changes, and other organisational, departmental and personal priorities, in determining,
not only when or how quickly change must be implemented, but what type of leadership
style they should employ.
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Perceived Justice of Change
Research Question 4a: How do perceptions of organisational justice mediate
cognitive evaluations of the change?
Research Question 4b: What affective responses occur as a result of these
evaluations?
Perceptions of fairness and unfairness played an important role in most participants’
cognitive and affective responses to the change they described. Justice issues have
already underpinned some of the responses to the first three research questions. In the
literature organisational justice has been separated into a number of discrete categories
with some evidence that there are four main types: distributive, procedural,
informational and interpersonal (Colquitt, 2001). Participants were specifically
questioned about these forms of justice as they related to an organisational change, and
asked to describe the emotions they consequently felt.
Distributive justice
Perceptions of distributive justice (which is about the outcomes of decisions) were
related to a number of aspects of an organisational change and were of varying degrees
of importance. Justice in the context of gains and losses was seen from both material
and non-material perspectives.
Participants were satisfied or pleased with fair material outcomes, for example
where they benefited from a good redundancy payout or a better role. Those who
experienced unfavorable material outcomes were disappointed, angry and frustrated. C
thought it was unfair to be given a shabby office in a relocation, B felt the same about a
lower salary and heavier workload, in moving into the downsizing project, and X was
unhappy with more expensive or less convenient parking options. Stronger emotions
were expressed when consequences were more severe, especially for those whose jobs
were lost or downgraded though restructuring. Some respondents experienced mixed
outcomes with varying perceptions of fairness, and mixed emotions. For example, L
was initially “undermined” by having to share a role she previously held alone, but two
years later was “euphoric” at securing the role for herself when the other person
resigned.
The fairness of non-material outcomes due to changes in status produced
positive and negative emotions. Some were proud that they had emerged from the
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change with enhanced reputations and more influence. On the other hand, H was
appalled at being relegated to a lower status role in a takeover, and P was angry and
frustrated that: our function was being devalued, the name was being changed which didn’t recognise
what we felt we actually did and I suppose emotionally that had a huge demoralising
effect on the team, on myself. And you know, who wants to work for an organisation that
actually doesn’t understand the importance of what you do?
Positive evaluations of fairness and the resultant emotions often occurred in
situations where people gained from the change and negative reactions when they did
not. E, a change leader and manager, suggested that “When people feel they have lost
something the element of fairness comes into it”. According to A, who was a senior
manager, but in this case was a change recipient, “things that seem fair and equitable
when you’re benefiting from them don’t seem quite so fair afterwards when you’re not.”
Participants expressed different views on the convergence of favourability and fairness
of outcomes. Even some who were made redundant confessed that although the
outcome was unfavourable it was not unfair. Losing one’s job in a restructuring was
perceived to be unfair by others (including those who managed the process), in the
sense that people often lost their jobs without doing anything to deserve it. F
commented that: If you were to take a legalistic, highly rational, mechanical definition around fairness, you
would say yes it was fair because the restructuring process was built and driven by rational,
mechanical criteria. In terms of emotional impact, very unfair…There were some
opportunities that emerged from it, but I think the emotional cost around those was very
significant.
Procedural justice
Respondents perceived many cases of procedural injustice. When L was told that she
and a new employee would be given the same level of management position and that in
due course one would take full control, she got very angry and anxious and cried.
Similarly, F experienced anxiety during the early stages of a restructuring when it was
unclear for a considerable length of time whether he or another manager would be given
the position of departmental head.
Some negative perceptions were based on exclusion from decision-making.
Lack of participation or ‘voice’ is a key issue because of the potential of poorer material
and relational outcomes. However, participation can enhance perceptions of procedural
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fairness even when outcomes are unfavourable. Participants who were senior managers
were particularly angry about their lack of involvement, given that they expected to be
included in major decisions, as they had been before. “I think my biggest distress is
actually the process, because of lack of involvement, and a decision that had a major
impact on my role being presented as a fait accompli” (A); “Decisions were already
taken before they even came to us…not a transparent process…cut out of circulation of
papers for comment” (P). Even at lower levels of management and among non-
managers lack of involvement was sometimes a sore point. Consultation was “token”
(F); “I was absolutely furious” when an agreed procedure was suddenly changed
without consultation (B); “We were all treated as if you’re okay, these are your orders,
you follow this and this and that. There was never a meeting…no consultation, no
consent” (X).
Procedures were mostly seen as fair by those who led or managed the changes
and who reported extensive consultation, a free exchange of views and a very
supportive environment, particularly when redundancies were being implemented. Little
emotion could be detected other than a sense of satisfaction or some pride that the
processes had been done in a competent and ethical fashion. Some change recipients did
not perceive unfair procedures even though their outcomes were unfavourable.
Perceptions of unethical behaviour triggered strong emotions. V was surprised
and confused when his computer was removed and searched, and dismayed when he
was suspended without being able to offer his observation of events. B was highly upset
when faced with the prospect that employees might first hear of redundancies through
the media (also an issue of informational injustice). X was distraught when he missed
out on a promotion to someone with shorter tenure and by what he believed was a clear
act of nepotism.
Informational justice
Absence of information made it more difficult for participants to deal with uncertainty,
make correct decisions and communicate honestly. It was also be interpreted as
undermining relationship issues. The provision of information about outcomes and
procedures is vital to create trust and mitigate negative emotions. X claimed he was lied
to about the reason he was given for missing out on promotion and cried about it in a
meeting with his supervisor. P complained that “Nobody was talking to us about why
these things were happening…I think this team felt that there wasn’t enough of a clear
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or convincing rationale to explain why those things were happening.” A was satisfied
with information about the nature of the change and the timeframe, but not the reason.
O was happy at the initial amount of information given about a major restructuring but
then resented the lack of continuity and what she viewed as a dishonest approach: I think in the beginning it was really transparent…they had a project plan around the
review and we had union representation on a steering committee. So in terms of that
process I thought it was good because it was democratic and there were representatives
and we had our own meetings as a union caucus and we’d get periodic reports. So I guess
the process was good and the timing of the process and the fairness of it, but I guess when
we got down to the nuts and bolts of someone actually losing their job, I found that there
was a lot of camouflaging and they actually broke the protocol. The management did a
couple of times because they sent out information before it had gone through the steering
committee or that was out of sync with what was supposed to happen in their own
timeframe document, and I guess in the end that was part of my justification for breaking
it, because they broke theirs.
Explanations enhance perceptions of justice and not only influence acceptance
of change, or alternatively minimise resistance, when outcomes are unfavourable, but
can also mitigate negative emotions. If there is uncertainty and anxiety about the
change, information may help to allay these fears and contribute to perceptions of
justice. U, for example, felt relieved to hear at an early stage of a takeover that no jobs
were threatened.
The timing and media of communication also influence perceptions of fairness.
B was incensed when she heard that a major redundancy was to be announced by the
CEO the following day. She believed this was unfair in various ways (for example, it
was done without consultation and she had to work all night to get out redundancy
notices) but in the context of informational injustice she was adamant that staff should
not first learn of redundancies from the media.
People who are constrained in giving information about change can feel negative
emotions, such as anxiety, if it reflects on their integrity, and frustration, anger or guilt
if staff are disadvantaged by the lack of information. T believed that staff, who were
relocated and engaged in a different line of work, had not been told of some of the
difficulties they might encounter. B was both angry with the way employees were being
treated and guilty because of the role she was required to play: Some cynical decisions made with the intent to pull the wool over the employees’ eyes
and it annoyed me because they thought that the employees were so stupid that they
couldn’t see it and that just really pissed me off…I felt like I’d deceived people…I felt
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compromised…I felt a bit dirty…I had been sullied…And I felt bad that I was having to
go and spout this stuff but I knew it wasn’t really the whole story. I had to cloak it in
really nice terms.
E, an experienced change leader and manager, advises full disclosure wherever
possible because: the information would be act more of a settling thing than anything else because it was
very clear then there were no other agendas….often change causes anxiety if people
believe they’ve got some facts but there’s more that they don’t know and they should.
Sharing information and providing explanations for a change can create
perceptions that change managers are neutral, honest, reasonable and sincere. Deception
makes people angry and resentful. Yet in some cases managers can also be caught
between the desire to act honestly and organisational approaches that constrain this. M
felt guilty when he could not release information to his staff when restructuring processes
were still being decided. “You know that you’re not telling the whole truth…You’ve got
to tell them lies.” Similarly, C confessed: It was a difficult time because frankly you know you’re telling lies and because there’s stuff
there that you know about that you cannot just come out and divulge…Because people are
protective and they know there’s stuff going on. They see people looking round the factory
in suits and they see lawyers in the office and you know there’s all sorts of things that
happen where they, the staff, perceive something is up, and so they ask you questions and
you can’t answer them. As I say, you’ve got to tell them lies.
Interpersonal justice
Perceptions of interpersonal justice revolve around issues of respect, politeness and
dignity and tend to rely primarily on direct contact with a decision-making agent,
usually one’s immediate manager. They can also relate to the ways in which outcomes,
procedures and information are communicated. Participants reported a mix of justice
and injustice and positive and negative emotions. Those who were treated in a decent
fashion expressed satisfaction. Recipients who believed that they were not treated with
respect expressed stronger negative emotions. M was a senior manager involved in
major restructuring but found that when he challenged the CEO, “he took everything
like that as a threat and…he yelled and ranted and raved.” M reflected that these
outbursts made him feel devastated, angry, frustrated and weak. From the opposite
perspective, managers and leaders of change were proud that they had handled
interpersonal situations well, even when they were faced with hostile and abusive staff.
There were different interpretations of inappropriate behaviour and consequently
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different emotions. When D was made redundant she observed that her boss felt very
uncomfortable in discussing it with her, perhaps because he had been pressured by
senior management into doing so, and would not look her in the eye. D felt some
pleasure at her manager’s discomfort, possibly as a counter to the anger and shock she
was feeling at elements of distributive and procedural injustice. Without any apparent
awareness of its affect, L’s male boss announced “may the best man win”, despite the
fact that two females had to contend for a management position.
People can perceive interpersonal injustice with regard to the way they and
others are treated. P, for example, reported that when the organisation was being taken
over existing management was supportive but the new management was “cold-hearted”.
O said her own manager was very approachable but that the CEO was “cold and
clinical”. B commented on the different orientations of middle and senior management
to a major redundancy. Whereas middle managers were considered to be caring of their
staff and dealt with them appropriately: senior management [were] completely cut off from and insensitive to the junior work
force and just make stupid comments to the media. They just didn’t think about the staff.
At that point they were just so cut off from them. They never got out amongst the
workforce. They never listened to them. They never interacted with them.
Summary of findings and discussion
A number of issues emerge from the findings on the fairness of change. Firstly, fairness
was an important factor to most change recipients, with differing emphases on the four
main types of justice, and there were more comments about injustice than justice.
Conversely, most of those who led or managed change claimed that all types of justice
were generally delivered, but some also noted that other change players held different
perceptions. While positive perceptions of this nature may be an outcome of a self-
serving bias (Gomm, 2004; Veal, 2005), my interpretation of their comments was that
they had tried extremely hard to manage the change in fair ways. Most of these
managers also saw fairness in the way they themselves had been treated by the
organisation or their line mangers.
Secondly, some participants equated personally favourable outcomes with fair
outcomes, confirming the findings of a meta-analysis by Brockner and Wiesenfeld
(1996) who define favourable outcomes in material terms. But others could accept that
outcomes were negative but fair, stating that the organisation had the right to make
decisions that disadvantaged them. A’s wry observation that when he had benefitted
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from previous decisions he tended to see them as fair, but not when matters went
against him, is an indication that some people do not see fairness issues as simply black
or white. Another point made by Brockner and Wiesenfeld is that unfavourable
outcomes can be mitigated by perceptions of other procedural justice. Thibaut and
Walker (1975) theorised that people see fairness when they give input to decisions and
participate in making them. Some of the participants in the current study who managed
redundancies and other types of negative changes, stressed the efforts they had made to
inform and consult staff wherever they could. Those who were change recipients were
incensed when they were denied participation or given inaccurate or too little
information. Literature is replete with empirical studies of organisational change that
show how participation and communication enhance fairness evaluations (e.g. Riolli &
Savicki, 2006; Barclay et al., 2005; Korsgaard et al. 2002; Kernan & Hanges, 2002;
Paterson & Cary, 2002). Brockner and Wiesenfeld (1996) interpreted their meta-
analysis to indicate that procedural justice becomes more important than distributive
justice when outcomes are negative as people query why their outcomes are poor.
However, Lind (2001) has questioned this, citing evidence that people are more
concerned with personal treatment than outcomes because the former can undermine
relationships and self-identity. Evidence of this approach is how one of my participants,
M, found it particularly disturbing when his boss lost his temper on several occasions,
even though the incidents did not affect his material outcomes. Barclay et al. (2005)
found that negative perceptions and emotions arise when people blame others for using
unfair procedures in organisational change, even when they benefit from them. This
type of situation was recounted by my participant, L, who finally secured a role for
which she and another employee had to battle.
Thirdly, while positive emotions, such as pride and satisfaction, accompanied
perceptions of justice, they tended to be more muted than the “hot and volatile” negative
emotions resulting from perceived injustice (Bies & Tripp (2002, p. 210), such as anger
and fear. Both B and Q referred to hostile and aggressive change recipients in situations
where emotional contagion was evident and B spoke of her own fury at the injustice of
the CEO’s approach to communicating downsizing information ahead of an agreed
schedule. Barclay et al. (2005) indicate in their empirical study that the importance of
the outcome to the individual is a major contributor to the intensity of the emotions
associated with the various fairness elements of the situation.
Fourthly, participants were not always able to separate the emotions arising from
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the different types of justice or injustice. In B’s case her intense anger was due to her
poor material outcomes (long working hours to get the information to victims before a
media announcement - distributive justice), her non-material outcomes (exclusion from
decision-making - procedural injustice), and because she had anticipated the impact on
others (employees hearing bad news via the mass media - informational injustice). The
incident was to her also an example of interpersonal injustice, with respect to herself
and others, “because he had not honoured the agreement” and because “he felt so little
of the employees.” Similarly, D was shocked and angry about losing her job, the
manner in which it was done and the way in which her manager had avoided eye contact
with her, and admitted that her emotions resulted from a combination of types of
injustice. Some participants identified specific types of justice, others used one element
as a broad indicator of the fairness of the change. It is plausible, as Lind (2001) advises,
that one salient feature may serve as a heuristic for overall fairness.
Fifthly, in some cases respondents reported on what they saw as unfair treatment
which was not always related to the change, but in their minds it may have appeared to
be. For example, X believed he was unfairly denied a day’s sick leave by the manager
who had unjustly been promoted above him.
Sixthly, cognitive and affective reactions to the fairness of change were partly
influenced by perceived changes to the psychological contract. While this construct was
not specifically raised in the interview questions, perceived breach or violation of the
psychological contract was seen in each of the four types of injustice experienced by
respondents. It is unsurprising that those managers who expected to be included in
organisational change decisions, but were not, implied that this infringed their rights, an
issue that has been well documented in the literature (e.g. Cropanzano & Prehar, 2001;
Turnley & Feldman, 1998). Participation in decision-making was rated as an important
item by MBA students in Lester and Kickul’s (2001) study of psychological contracts.
The emotions that arise depend on whether the contract was seen to have been
inadvertently breached or deliberately violated (Robinson & Rousseau, 1997) and are
more intense for violation. Violations during restructuring were common perceptions in
a study conducted by Turnley and Feldman (1998), and several of my respondents
particularly viewed redundancy or downgraded jobs as a violation of the psychological
contract if they believed it was unjustified. D felt “betrayed” by the sudden termination
of her employment, the same term used by Morrison and Robinson (1994) to depict
employee reactions to psychological contract violation. Lack of information and
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insensitive language and behaviour from management in a change context could also
have been seen as a contract violation. Respondents to Lester and Kickul’s (2002)
survey listed open and honest communication, support from management, trust and
respect as contract items.
Finally, lack of control over change processes outcomes again emerges as a key
factor in the participants’ cognitive and affective reactions to change, partly because
exclusion from decision-making is seen as procedurally unfair, partly because it
undermines influence over the favourability and fairness of change outcomes (Thibaut
& Walker, 1975).
In conclusion, fairness was a very important element to most participants but the
interviews and the literature (e.g. Brockner & Wiesenfeld, 1996; Lind, 2001; Barclay et
al., 2005) remain ambiguous and inconsistent as to the interactive effects of various
types of justice, and the nature and intensity of the emotions they produce. Important
outcomes to participants, such as redundancy, were not always considered unfair, and
emotions, both from fairness and unfairness, showed differing levels of intensity. The
four types of justice identified by Colquitt (2001) were only sometimes congruent, and
the multiple combinations and contexts reflect the ambiguity of the role of justice in
cognitive and affective responses to change.
The four research questions analysed above reveal that affective reactions to
change events are based on a number of issues that lie within employee perceptions of
the change itself. The analysis also reveals how the factor may overlap. For example,
perceptions of negative outcomes may be accompanied by, and exacerbated by,
perceptions that the change was too big, too fast and unfairly executed.
Variables within the employee moderating cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses to change
People’s responses on cognitive, affective and behavioural levels are moderated by four
factors that lie within the individuals themselves: their emotional intelligence,
personalities, previous experiences of change, and change and stress outside the
workplace. It should be noted again that EI in this study is conceptualised as ability.
Some researchers (e.g. Goleman, 1995; Bar-On, 1997) have considered EI also to have
personality dimensions but in these findings they will be covered in Research Question
6 on disposition.
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Emotional Intelligence (EI)
Research Question 5: How does employee emotional intelligence moderate
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change?
This research question investigates the impact of people’s own EI on their responses to
an organisational change. This is different to how they perceive the impact of their
managers’ EI on their responses (Research Question 10) but comments made in the
latter question, and elsewhere, provided additional insights into their own EI.
Respondents were asked what emotions they and others had experienced, and, where
relevant, how they had managed both. One of the interesting aspects of the research
question is what impact EI has on the roles of change recipient, manager or leader.
The ability model of emotional intelligence of Mayer and Salovey (1997) in
Figure 2 will be used as the basis of analysis of findings as it was identified in the
literature review as the one that has garnered the most academic support (e.g. Daus &
Ashkanasy, 2005; Jordan 2005, McEnrue & Groves, 2006). The model contains four
levels or branches of ability: perception of appraisal and expression of emotion;
emotional facilitation of thinking, and understanding and analysing emotions;
employing emotional knowledge; and reflective regulation of emotions to promote
emotional and intellectual growth. Each level has four subsets of skills and these were
used as codes in interpreting the data. Given that there are 16 EI abilities and three
different types of change player in the 24 interviewees it is not feasible to provide a full
review of these 48 combinations. I will present my analysis of participants’ EI one level
at a time before making an overall evaluation of the role EI played in the cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses to change of the different types of change players.
Level 1 deals with the perception of participants’ own emotions, and those of
others, and the ability to express emotions accurately. Participants showed varying
degrees of ability to express their emotions (albeit in the interview rather than when the
change took place). Some seemed to have no problem articulating their emotions in
some parts of the interview but hesitated and stumbled in others, even after prompting.
Respondents were repeatedly asked to identify their emotions with respect to a variety
of aspects of change and the findings chapter is peppered with identification of
emotions. Some statements serve as useful examples: “I was furious because he had not
honoured the agreement that we’d had and therefore had undermined the employees”
(B); “At the time, confusion which caused self-doubt, certainly a bit of anger in there”
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(L); “At the beginning I guess my emotion was shock, horror… Sometimes it was
inspiring, you know, oh my God, this is all happening and isn’t it great, and you sort of
get into that excitement of seeing it all move” (R).
The ability to perceive others’ emotions was evident in all participants. Change
recipients such as O observed a colleague who, during a restructure and redundancy
initiative, was “traumatised, crying, didn’t want to be at work, really frightened”, while
B noted that some lower staff had felt “betrayed” and “devastated” and that some
middle managers had felt “gutted” because “they cared about their people deeply”.
Some change managers and leaders were particularly adept at discerning the emotions
of subordinates and colleagues. C, who was transferred to a new organisation following
a buyout, commented that some of those who were made redundant showed “shock,
dismay, real concern”, while others were happier and more satisfied because of the
redundancy payout. In other redundancies, G noted denial and anger in those laid off
and stress in colleagues on the management team who had to manage heavier workloads
and difficult interpersonal issues; W detected anger, denial, and frustration in those who
lost their jobs, but also enthusiasm among those retained in restructured roles; and N
observed, “You see people in organisations putting on very brave faces but some are
falling apart inside”. Some participants even focused on the emotional reactions of their
bosses and more senior staff. Box 1.4 of the Mayer and Salovey model refers to the
ability to discriminate between honest and dishonest emotional expressions. X thought
his boss to be completely phoney in saying, “let us pray together”, when he bitterly
complained about being unfairly passed over for promotion.
Level 2 is concerned with the degree to which EI facilitates thinking. This was
not directly investigated in the interview questions but comments made elsewhere are
testimony to the use of this ability. Box 2.2 refers to emotions aiding memory (and
judgement) and one might thus be tempted to state that people who could recall
emotions from several years back are high in EI. However, this recall might simply
highlight an event of emotional intensity or a good memory rather than ability to think
with emotion. From a conceptual point of view those who have insight into their own
emotions or those of others should be able to manage their own behaviour or respond to
others appropriately. It was apparent that a number of change leaders and managers who
anticipated that others would manifest negative affective reactions from unfavourable
outcomes organised briefing sessions about upcoming changes and made counselling
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and other forms of support available. Some used their own feelings of anxiety to ensure
that their actions were well thought out.
Level 3 is about understanding and using emotions in a number of ways. Those
who have considerable ability at this level can accurately label emotions, see what
triggered them, understand how complex they can be and how they can change over
time. Most respondents had no difficulty understanding why they or others experienced
positive or negative emotions during change. Some change leaders and managers noted
that they simultaneously had positive and negative thoughts and feelings about the
change, for example, that they could feel excited about the outcomes of change and the
challenges of multiple processes, as well as some anxiety about possible failure. Others
felt a degree of guilt that certain outcomes or processes were not handled well and pride
that most had been.
The most advanced skill at this level is the ability to understand transitions
between emotions. A number of participants used the terms rollercoaster or grief cycle
to convey how they (and others) experienced the emotional highs and lows of
organisational change. They showed understanding of how people are often stunned by
bad news, and go into a state of denial and anger before reaching some level of
accommodation. This conceptual knowledge was probably acquired through a variety of
formal, informal and non-formal learning opportunities but was usefully applied in
situations of actual change. Some reflected that they themselves went though this type
of cycle and were able to emerge from the experience with their dignity and integrity
intact, even though they bore some emotional scars. This was particularly evident in two
change recipients. D reflected that the process of her redundancy was “a real cathartic
exercise, it made me move on mentally” and V, when he finally won a court case for
unfair dismissal, commented that “there’s only so much emotional hurt you can go
through...and it was almost like closure, just knowing that it was over and I could move
on.” During the processes, however, these respondents had battled to contain their
feelings.
Those who are able to move from recognition (that emotions can change) to
regulation are demonstrating skills at Level 4 of the Mayer and Salovey model. This
contains the highest level of EI abilities with people able to stay open to positive and
negative feelings, detach from them when necessary, monitor and regulate their own
emotions and effectively address the emotions of others. Participants reported both
success and failure in emotion regulation: “I had to put on a brave face” (A); “I usually
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keep my mouth shut” (E); “I find it hard to be an actor. I tend to wear my emotions on
my sleeve. I found it difficult not to show my emotions” (H); “implicitly I felt it
necessary to internalise and not pass on all the conflict that was happening in the design
process” (P). Two admitted that they had cried (one male, X, one female, L) and it
seemed they would prefer not to have done so. D confessed, “I wanted to sit there and
howl my eyes out.” However, she managed to maintain her composure and laughingly
remarked that it was because she was “English, stiff upper lip, you don’t, try not to
show your emotions.” H admitted that she had an emotional outburst in a meeting with
the chairperson of the company and that she had found it difficult not to show her
frustration.
A number of reasons were provided: “I am very disciplined” (P); “it was just
part of my job” (F); “I was being paid to do it” (B); or because they believed it was
“professional” (A, F, K). Some participants concealed their emotions because they knew
that their display might count against them at some time (M, X), or because it was not
part of the organisational culture (L). When L cried in a meeting she was told she was
soft and should never do it again, particularly in the male-dominated “very stiff upper
lip environment.” X said if a person verbalised negative emotions in meetings it was
considered resistance to change and “you became a target”.
There were other pressures outside of those of cultural expectations. Participants
who were change leaders and managers often experienced frustration at the slow pace of
change, or people’s resistance to change, but believed that they needed to contain their
emotions to be effective. R was told to “calm” her enthusiasm by senior staff who
thought she was “too strong, too passionate.” Y believed that as owner and CEO he
needed to regulate his negative emotions because they could impact on morale.
The pinnacle of EI ability, according to Mayer and Salovey (1997), is
simultaneously being able to regulate one’s own emotions and manage the positive and
negative emotions of others. W, a senior manager, ventured the opinion that,
“sometimes management is assumed to have no emotions and to be hard and callous
and uncaring.” The demands placed on some people were very taxing. B, a relatively
young human resources officer at the time, was involved in union and worker meetings
regarding a redundancy. In some ways she was operating as a change manager and in
others as a change recipient. She commented on what she termed was a “horribly
dysfunctional culture” in the organisation and was somewhat ambivalent in recalling
how she dealt with it:
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…it was almost violent, aggressive. It was very aggressive. Almost having a hint of menace
and violence to it.…At one time actually the guys…were really swearing at me and using
really full on swear words and things…and these guys were just absolutely going for it you
know. They were being really abusive and swearing at me and calling me a bitch and all
sort of stuff…It was really out of control and that didn’t worry me, I mean sometimes it
didn’t worry me too much.
Q had been brought into a company to manage restructuring, redundancies and
job redesign and found some elements of the exchanges to be very demanding while
others were very pleasing: You had people in your office screaming and yelling and telling us we’ve been doing this
for 20 years and what you’re asking us to do is no different, so why are you putting us
through this stress? To people saying, thank goodness, someone has finally recognised that
we need to do this and make this change, and for goodness sake, just give me the authority
to make these changes and do these things.
To manage the strong, negative feelings of others requires insight and
considerable skill. E, a senior manager with extensive change experience, advises that: If someone bursts into tears, don’t keep saying, “there, there, it’s alright”. It’s not, it’s not
for them. The best thing to do is just shut up and pass them a tissue and the fact is the
person will now feel particularly embarrassed because they have burst into tears. But don’t
make a big deal about it. Just let them gain their composure, be the first to move forward.
In addition to maintaining outward and inward control of their emotions, a
number of my participants employed other types of coping strategies, such as spending
time with friends and family, going to the gym or using other forms of exercise and
relaxation. A “deliberately tried to reframe, “you know, to look for the benefits, but
there was also a recognition that things had to change” and X “just kept on focussing on
a good outcome.” Others tried more proactive approaches by arguing against certain
aspects of change or recommending practical actions. When asked how he managed his
emotions Y replied that he did not, he just got on with the job at hand. E’s approach was
to “work through priorities, you filter out what you need and you put in hours.” F
acknowledged that one of his ways of coping was “actively looking out for myself at the
same time as well, looking at other options…So I knew I had a plan B.” Some decided
that the only way to deal with the negative cognitive and affective outcomes of the
change was to exit the organisation. Not all approaches used by participants were
successful in either dealing with their emotions or resolving the situations that led to
them.
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Summary of findings and discussion
In summary, there was considerable evidence of how most of the abilities of EI of the
Mayer and Salovey (1997) model contributed to the responses to change of each type of
change player. This study therefore adds to the sparse qualitative literature on EI, and
while none of it has directly examined organisational change, some commonality has
been found. Conceptual and empirical literature on EI provides more useful points of
comparison, although even here the context of change has seldom been researched.
Huy (2002) and Jordan (2005) have proposed that EI helps change players cope
with various aspects of change, Paterson and Härtel (2002) have suggested that it would
be particularly helpful in coping with the anxiety of downsizing, and Jordan et al.
(2002a) believe that EI could also help alleviate some of the uncertainty associated with
job insecurity. In one study, Jordan and Troth (2002) found that EI is helpful in dealing
with conflict and speculate that this might be useful in change contexts. The findings in
the current study indicate that EI did help participants to cope with the emotions arising
from conflict, downsizing and job insecurity.
In one of the few empirical studies on EI and change, Vakola et al. (2004) found
that overall EI contributed to attitudes to change. Of particular note was the use of
emotions in problem solving. This Level 2 ability of the Mayer and Salovey model was
applied by respondents in Akerjordet and Severinsson’s (2004) qualitative study of EI
(albeit not in a change scenario). One remarked, “When I get a feeling during an
encounter with a patient I have learned to take it seriously”, while a second stated, “I
think that feelings can contribute towards good decision-making as they give me signal
about what is right and wrong” (p. 16). While my respondents were not quite as
specific, some change leaders and managers indicated that awareness of potential
emotional responses of others helped them plan the communication and participation
aspects of change. Some also analysed their own positive and negative emotions and
used this information to deal with their emotions.
The impact of EI on transformational leadership, which has a strong orientation
to change, has been demonstrated empirically (e.g. Barling, Slater & Kelloway, 2000;
Mandell & Pherwani, 2003; Gardner & Stough, 2002; Palmer et al., 2000; Brown et al.,
2006). Change leaders and managers in the current study made a number of comments
that showed considerable EI, although I could not ascertain what impact this had on
followers. The perceptions of the participants of the EI of their leaders will be addressed
in Research Question 10.
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Many of the emotion- and problem-focused coping strategies to manage
stressful situations identified by Folkman and Lazarus (1985; 1988) were employed by
the participants. Most participants used various forms of social support which Folkman
and Lazarus (1988) say covers both types of approach. Some simply spent time with
people whose company they enjoyed while others discussed work-related issues with
colleagues and more senior managers. In their qualitative studies of EI, N. Clarke
(2006) and Akerjordet and Severinsson (2004) found that sharing emotional experiences
with colleagues or supervisors in a supportive environment was a helpful way for nurses
to deal with their emotions, and of learning new ways of doing so. In this study G spoke
of the value of peer counselling in his organisation and how this had helped him in
particular to deal with change issues.
A number of my participants used other emotion-focused coping strategies listed
by Folkman and Lazarus (1988) such as exercise (a form of ‘distancing’), ‘positive
reappraisal’ (such as A’s attempt to reframe the nature of the change) and ‘self-control’
(for example, by participants trying to act professionally and not show emotion
inappropriately). The need to be professional was particularly evident in managers, and
noted in the findings of Kramer and Hess’ (2002) study. Managers, and the member-
based associations that represent them, view themselves as professionals (e.g. the New
Zealand Institute of Management, 2008; the Australian Institute of Management, 2008).
Professionals are considered to be those who have a sense of competency and whose
personal actions meets a standard often defined in a code of conduct (e.g. Australian
Institute of Management, 2008) or taken to be an implicit element of the role (Fournier,
1999). Some used the problem-focused approach of what (Folkman & Lazarus, 1988)
term ‘planful problem solving’ by arguing against certain aspects of change or
recommending practical actions. Empirical literature on organisational change has
shown the value to employees at different levels - and their organisations - of using
coping strategies (e.g. Fugate et al., 2008; Rafferty & Griffin, 2006; Woodward &
Hendry; 2004; Rudisill & Edwards, 2002).
While Mayer and Salovey (1997) have arranged their model in hierarchical
form, they do not indicate that people can only demonstrate the highest level of skills if
they have mastered those at lower levels. Some participants who appeared to me to have
high levels of EI were found wanting (by themselves too) in various aspects of a change
or in the normal course of their jobs. For example, both L and X cried in confrontations
with their bosses and regretted doing so. For L, it was particularly galling as she had to
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deal with a male-dominated environment that frowned on emotional displays. In
interviewing female leaders, Sachs and Blackmore (1998, p. 271) found a common
theme. “You never show you can’t cope. Being in control of your feelings and emotions
was important if you wanted to be taken seriously in the job and if you were to be
rewarded by promotion.” In the same way that people with advanced musical or
sporting ability are not always ‘on form’, it cannot be assumed that people who are high
in EI always manage their emotions well or respond to others appropriately. Just as
performance on a formal EI test can be subject to the influence of mood, so too can
performance in a real change depend on mood, environmental circumstance and the
peculiar demands of the change. Nevertheless, those who lead or manage change may at
times need the highest levels of EI. Huy (2002) found that to be effective managers of
change have to be able to balance both followers’ and their own pleasant, high
activation emotions, such as excitement, with low activation, negative emotions such as
disappointment and fatigue.
The findings in the current study also demonstrate the intersection of the
constructs of EI and emotional labour, the expectation that certain emotions will be
expressed and others hidden (Hochschild, 1983). It was an effort for many of the
participants to control their negative emotions. There is little empirical work on the
relationship between EI and emotional labour. Prati and Perrewé (2006) found that
respondents with high EI experienced less stress and burnout when required to fake or
hide emotions. Brotheridge (2006) reported that people high in EI are more likely to
engage in deep acting rather than surface acting. In N. Clarke’s (2006) qualitative study
of EI among nurses, respondents pointed to the more supportive professional nursing
culture as an influence on how they engaged with the emotions of patients while dealing
with their own. In the context of organisational change, hiding emotions was found to
be necessary by respondents of Turnbull (1999) who thought it best to keep their feeling
to themselves, and of Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006), some of whom had been
criticised for expressing negative emotions and not acting in the purported interests of
the organisation.
Finally, it is interesting to note that a number of participants were informed
about the construct and used the terms EI or EQ of their own accord. Others used the
term emotional rollercoaster (Goss et al., 1998; Kochan, 1999; Schneider &
Goldwasser, 1998) and either the term grief cycle referred to by Kübler-Ross (1969) or
the words that capture phases of it, like shock, denial and anger. Previous exposure to
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these constructs seemed to help participants understand the emotional nature of
organisational change.
Some researchers have considered EI (Goleman, 1995; Bar-On, 1997; Tett, et
al., 2005) to be partly related to personality and it is to dispositional factors that I now
turn.
Disposition
Research Question 6: How does employee disposition moderate cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses to change?
Respondents were specifically asked how, in terms of their personality, they usually
responded to change. Some gave additional insights into various aspects of personality
elsewhere in the interview. Some comments were directly related to change, others
more indirectly. The Big Five model of personality (Digman, 1990; McCrae & John,
1992) is the most widely accepted (e.g. Van der Zee & Wabeke, 2004; Van Rooy &
Viswesveran, 2004. I will therefore use this framework first, and even though it
considers that all traits are subsumed under one of the five categories, a number of
specific traits were highlighted elsewhere in the change literature and surfaced in the
interviews.
The most important Big Five characteristic in dealing with change is openness to
experience, which produces cognitive reactions that lead to emotions of varying levels
of intensity. Most participants claimed that they were comfortable with change, or
positive about it, whereas B said it was exciting, Q found it energising and S remarked,
“I love change, I thrive on change.” Some had a more considered view, that if change
was beneficial, particularly to them, but also to the organisation, they naturally
embraced it more willingly. Two had somewhat different views that also reflected some
ambivalence. C commented that although: I am quite relaxed about making change…I don’t make change easily. I won’t sort of chop
and change every five minutes but I will make change. Everything I do is considered and if
change is necessary I will make it.
He said that he had lived in the same house, and until recently had been in the
same company for over 30 years and was comfortable with that. In one sense he noted
that he was out of his “comfort zone” in terms of moving to an a new organisation, but
in another way “in the comfort zone because of…things if you like I can do in my sleep,
same products, same people, and same people I was dealing with outside this
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company.” Similarly, D confessed: I always say I hate change and yet when I look back on my life I do tend to go for things
that require change…I do dislike change but once I’ve been through the pros and cons and I
think it is a good idea then I move on.
The second Big Five trait of relevance is conscientiousness, with participants
saying that when change was required, regardless of their thoughts or feelings, they did
what was necessary, several claiming that they did so because it was the professional
approach to take. P said she was “disciplined” and that “my role as public servant is to
implement government policy.” Managers, in particular, were adamant that even when
they disapproved of a change they felt it was incumbent on them to do what was
required. L deprecatingly remarked, “up until that point in my life I’ve always done
what is expected of me pretty much. I’ve always been very conscientious.” R revealed,
“I don’t like to fail…and I don’t like to promise something and not deliver.”
Agreeableness is a characteristic that indicates that people will be pleasant when
dealing with others and trusting, warm, kind and considerate. Of special note is L’s
reference to how she views her relationship with others affected by change, “I do care a
lot about people’s feelings and I don’t like to hurt people” and remarked about the way
a rival for her position had been treated by management. “I felt sad. I constantly
checked…and reflected to make sure I had not contributed to any more bad feelings that
she was already having.” O also took responsibility for supporting a colleague who
found change traumatic, and showed that sympathy can be altruistic but also beneficial
to a person’s own wellbeing: I seriously had concerns for her health and she’s a very shy, quiet person and her father had
died actually, which probably compounded the situation…it meant that I could focus on
someone other than myself and care for her and provide support for her…that feeling of
helping is good.
Extraversion is a quality that enables people to voice opinions and feelings and
can be used to influence change initiatives or in some ways cope with the change. While
it will be explored in more detail in a later section on behavioural responses to change,
it should be noted that most respondents, particularly those in management positions,
commented that they had debated the changes, and often argued against them, with their
colleagues and superiors. Extraversion was detected more from what most participants
reported to have said than any comments they made about their personality traits. M,
however, was more explicit: “I am a pretty open person…I tend to be a vigorous
debater” and confronted his boss about aspects of the change even though the latter was
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known to frequently lose his temper. B commented, “If it’s change I don’t like then I
announce that I don’t like it” and E believed his extraversion helped manage others’
emotions during change.
The last of the Big Five variables is neuroticism, which is characterised by
excessive anxiety, anger and irritability. The comments participants made in Research
Question 5 on EI can generally be construed as reflecting people who tend to experience
more positive than negative emotions, and are able to control their emotions when
necessary. Some exercised control as a protective mechanism, others because it was
expected of them as ‘professionals’, particularly if they were managers, and acting
professionally was a reflection of their self-identity. While some admitted that they had
been unable to regulate the display of emotion when they would prefer to have done so,
one cannot take isolated incidents of control, or lack of control, as being representative
of a personality trait. Many specifically referred to a predilection for being positive
when dealing with organisational change.
In addition to the Big Five, a number of other traits contributed to the ways in
which participants responded to change. Two of these are closely related: locus of
control, the belief that one can influence events; and self-efficacy, the belief one has the
ability to deal with certain types of situation. Several respondents made it clear that the
more control they had over change the more comfortable they were with it: “It all
depends on whether I’m the architect of change or whether I’m having the change
imposed on me” (A); “It’s better if I’m driving it” (R); “I think I’m good with change to
be honest. I like to initiate it so I guess that’s an issue and because I wasn’t in control of
part of that process and probably felt too far from the loci, I suppose, which is
something I learnt about myself” (O). People with a high internal locus of control tend
to have the confidence (self-efficacy) that they can deal with the cognitive, emotional
and behavioural challenges of an organisational change, and most participants believed
they had the ability to cope with change. E spoke of some people who focused on what
he termed was a “circle of influence” and those who focused on a “circle of concern”,
and that change often moves people from the former to the latter. They “love to spend
their time worrying about what is beyond their ability to influence, so it depends on
personality.” People with a high internal locus of control need the added capacity to
know when they can influence events and when they cannot. A noticeable emotional
reaction of those with a high internal locus of control was frustration when confronted
with situations where they were unable to exert sufficient influence. H noted:
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Well I tend to get quite frustrated and I show frustration, I find it very difficult to
withhold…to not be frustrated. So to go to this environment…there’s some absolutely
ridiculous things happening and…if I think something is ludicrous, I find it very difficult to
not show my frustrations of what’s happening. But no, as far as change goes, I’m normally
quite comfortable.
Most respondents demonstrated empathy. Many comments elsewhere in the
findings section of this study indicate that participants were keenly aware of how
change was impacting on others, and that support needed to be provided. G referred to
the “trauma” and “anxiety” that accompanies downsizing. C spoke of the “shock,
dismay, real concern” when redundancies were announced but also noted some were
“happier” and “somewhat pleased” at the prospect of redundancy pay. “With people
who were obviously upset you had to try and sort of gauge how they felt…and you
treated each person differently.” Some of the change leaders specifically mentioned the
term empathy to characterise some of their own responses to the emotions of others and
pointed out that support needed to be provided: I’ve been through nine organisational restructures in my 20 years of employment…What I
think it helped me most with, though, is actually having some empathy and understanding.
Because there are people who have never been through organisational change and…there’s
been people in this business who’ve been in the last few years aware of change but it hasn’t
actually impacted on them. Until it’s personal it’s actually quite hard for people to kind of
really understand what it means (N).
In some respects I guess part of what I do is put myself out there to be the person that they
can do that with because they need that and you want to be that for them. So recognising
the pain they’re going in you want to give them the best opportunity to get that out, because
holding it in is even worse…I find myself empathising with them…absolutely empathising
with the situation they’re in, whether they’re frustrated and angry or personally not making
sense or whatever. They are where they are and they need to get it out and it’s important to
be there to allow them to get it out. So I try very hard not to take it personally (Q).
Yes, I’m always concerned of the personal impact. I have empathy for people’s situations.
I’ve personally been made redundant from my employer twice, so I know the impact it can
have and there’s always other things going on in people’s lives that we don’t necessarily
know about as employers. So I think we try to treat people with dignity and respect and be
cognisant of the impact that these decisions are having on them (W).
Optimism is an aspect of positive affectivity and openness to experience and
was specifically identified by a number of participants as a way they tended to view
organisational change. People who are optimistic about change are likely to support it
or at least look for positive elements. “I am a natural optimist”, said Q, “optimistic
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about the way people behave but never surprised by the way they behave.” Some
participants tended to focus on outcomes for themselves. For example, D and K were
made redundant and reflected in the interviews that this helped them kick-start their
own businesses, and F moved into a new functional discipline within the same
organisation and started a satisfying new leg of his career. Some participants were
optimistic that some changes would benefit customers, colleagues or others. Optimism
is also partially dependent on change self-efficacy. People who are convinced that a
change will turn out well for them may partly believe this because they have the
confidence to succeed at something new and because they have the capacity to deal
with the emotional consequences. But, as C explained, a positive attitude could not
always be maintained: I tried to be as positive as possible with various staff I had to work with and talk to in
terms of the change….At most times I tried to remain positive and look at a positive
outcome…It became difficult at times.
Pragmatism was evident in some respondents who viewed organisational change
as inevitable and requiring an intelligent response. J remarked, “My attitude to change is
that it’s expected and it’s going to happen anyway so it’s not the change, it’s how we
respond to the change…I find change to be natural and expected” and V commented, “I
think change is something that we just live with.” This does not indicate a submissive or
agreeable nature, but rather a cognitive orientation, which is neither optimistic nor
pessimistic, that what cannot be influenced should not become an emotional bugbear.
People with cognitive rigidity are unlikely to change, even when the necessity arises.
Resilience is a quality that helps people manage difficult situations, including
those arising from change. H indicated, “I consider myself quite a resilient person… I’m
used to having lots of things on the go…and being quite resilient.” However, after being
demoted from the most senior management position following a take over, she noted
that “this time I didn’t seem to have the resilience.” Resilience may be a crucial factor
in coping with change or even develop as a result of dealing successfully with change.
Q observed that people in the company were “battle-hardened” and that “change
happens all the time, get over it even when it’s happening to you, [being made] three or
four times redundant in a life isn’t an unusual thing.” The less resilient may view
previous unsuccessful change with cynicism. Past experience with change will be dealt
with in more detail in the next research question.
The need for closure influenced the way in which V reacted to change. He found
that the extended period in which he fought a case of unfair dismissal was draining and
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reflected that “there’s only so much emotional hurt that you can go through and
uncertainty and it was almost like closure, just knowing that it was over and that I could
move on.” Change is often accompanied by uncertainty which triggers anxiety, and the
ending of a process, even one with negative outcomes, brings relief. It is difficult to
assess whether V’s need for closure was dispositional or situational but it does seem
likely that many people would find it difficult to cope with the range of issues from a
series of events of this nature. People who suffer the agony of waiting to see if their
name is on the redundancy list also want closure since there are both practical and
psychological implications. O decided to pre-empt this and found another job before
names were announced.
Cynicism, which has negative emotional overtones, can be dispositional and in
the context of change can lead to resistance or at least lack of engagement in it.
Cynicism about organisational change can also arise from previously failed change
initiatives. It is not easy, however, to gauge in a multi-faceted interview, whether the
cynicism of interviewees is dispositional, situational or both. F remarked on one aspect
of the change, “They’d recognised somehow that people were actually important in this
process. Good gracious me.” At the end of the interview B commented on
organisational change in general, not the specific change she talked about and which
had happened several years previously: I don’t think I can consider an organisational change in any positive way in terms of the
impact that it had on the organisation afterwards. In terms of the individual...I think sure
there are big costs…it just ends up by being for the individual such a tough thing. Even if
it’s in terms of workload increases or that they lose their best mate or they take away the
cafeteria. It’s never about adding more stuff, it’s about taking away… I don’t think I’ve
ever known a change process that added something, it’s always taking away and it’s always
pitched positively and people always know that’s a crock.
Summary of findings and discussion
Disposition clearly can play a key role in how people respond to change and in different
contexts different traits become salient. It should be emphasised that the traits discussed
by participants are mostly reflective of insights into their own personalities. In some
cases I have interpreted their responses to indicate specific traits but do not claim that
these are accurate psychological assessments. These methodological issues will be
discussed in more detail in Chapter 7.
The Big Five theory has been researched in the context of change and all
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variables have been found to correlate with attitudes to change (Vakola et al., 2004).
Openness to experience, which Watson and Clark (1997) identified as a component of
positive affectivity, is the most relevant of the factors in terms of dealing with
organisational change. Most respondents claimed to be comfortable with change,
supporting the findings of other research studies. Tolerance for risk and ambiguity are
hallmarks of people who adapt well to change (Judge et al., 1999). People who are open
to new experience, according to Oreg (2003), lack cognitive rigidity and will change
their minds when it is right to do so. Presumably, the affective and behavioural
components of attitudes to change will likewise alter, but some discrepancy or
ambivalence can be expected (Piderit, 2000). Wanberg and Banas (2004) took a slightly
different route by surveying responses to specific changes in an organisation and found
that openness to change to be a significant influence.
The other Big Five factors have also been empirically related to organisational
change. Conscientiousness has been found to be relevant factor by Brennan and
Skarlicki (2004), Moon et al. (2008) and Vakola et al. (2004) and a number of
participants in the current study used the term professionalism in explaining how they
responded to changes they did not like. The orientation to professionalism is consistent
with the findings of Kramer et al. (2004, p. 97), whose research into responses to
change by pilots led them to conclude that “Professionals who are highly committed to
their work are more concerned about their jobs than about their organizations.”
Agreeableness appeared to be a trait that influenced a number of participants to either
accept the change or help other staff to adapt to it. There is little empirical support for
the value of agreeableness in organisational change, apart from the study of Vakola et
al. (2004) and the report by Brennan and Skarlicki (2004) that a negative form of
agreeableness, ‘angry hostility’, correlated with opposition to downsizing. Extraversion,
also a factor in the Myers Briggs et al. (1998) model, does not seem to have been
researched other than by Vakola et al. (2004). However, in the current study a number
of respondents indicated that they tended to voice their opinions on organisational
change, both positive and negative. The last of the Big Five factors, neuroticism, has
been negatively correlated to organisational change by Vakola et al. (2004). This is a
trait that is difficult to discern in one-off interviews and proved to be the case in the
current study. In summary, participants demonstrated some evidence of how the Big
Five factors influenced their responses to change, and supports previous research, thin
as it is, with regard to some of the factors.
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The interviews also showed the relevance of other specific traits that are located
within the all embracing Big Five and which have been shown by other researchers to
be important in dealing with change. For example, there is strong research evidence for
the relevance of locus of control, change self-efficacy, resilience and cynicism (Herold
et al. 2007; Holt et al., 2007, Chen & Wang, 2007; Lau & Woodman, 1995; Judge et al.
1999; Jimmieson et al. 2004, Wanberg & Banas, 2004; Stanley et al. 2005; Wanous et
al., 2000; Connell & Waring, 2002), and to a lesser extent for pragmatism (Myers
Briggs et al., 1998), the need for closure (Kruglanski et al., 2007), and optimism, the
last being seen as an element of positive affectivity and openness to experience (Watson
& Clark, 1997; Judge et al, 1999).
People who have reflected on their personality - and particularly those who have
been guided in doing so - are often able to cope with change in productive ways if they
can harness their strengths and address their weaknesses. One respondent, G, was even
aware of his personality profile in terms of one well-known model (Myers Briggs et al.,
1998) and how it affected his response to an organisational change. He provided some
examples of how he thought his personality had helped him deal with organisational
change: I’m not that demonstrative… if you look at me in my Myers-Briggs profile I am an INFP,
which is really strange for an HR manager but you learn that extravertiveness…So that was
how I was using my emotions. If somebody was angry I could empathise with the anger
and I’d walk them through it. If somebody was denying that they needed to worry about
getting a job, I’d say well, you know what’s going on in life.
However, the cognitive, affective and behavioural demands of a change may
exceed people’s coping mechanisms. The quote from H above on the limits to her
resilience is a case in point. Cole et al. (2006, p. 467) specifically found that
psychological hardiness (which incorporates elements of “commitment, control and
challenge”) contributed to resilience, predicted lower cynicism and produced more
positive emotions. In their studies of nurses in cancer wards, Ablett and Jones (2007)
found hardiness to be a helpful trait even though some nurses claimed not to like job-
related change.
Thus while disposition may provide a foundation for individual responses to
change, it has to operate in tandem with other individual differences (Oreg, 2006; Holt
et al, 2007). For example, being able to control one’s emotions may be a sign of the
trait of emotional stability (McCrae & Costa, 1987), but could also be taken as evidence
of the ability to control one’s emotions (Salovey & Mayer, 1997). The wide range of
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factors identified in the model presented in this thesis also play a role, including the
context factors of a specific change, previous experience of change and perceptions of
both change leaders and managers. Some of these issues will be pursued in the next
Research Question 7 on previous experience with change and in Research Questions 9,
10 and 11, which deal with the perceived leadership ability, EI and trustworthiness of
change leaders and managers.
Previous Experience of Change
Research Question 7: How do employees’ previous experiences of change
moderate cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change?
People respond to an organisational change with a combination of abilities, attitudes and
dispositional traits. Some of these responses are influenced by previous experience of
change (at work and in other facets of life). Regardless of their attitude to an announced
change, the ability to learn from previous experience, particularly of change, is a key
factor that helps people cope. Change can result in a more challenging workload,
require the acquisition of new technical, organisational or people-oriented capabilities,
and at times necessitates considerable psychological adjustment.
Participants were therefore directly questioned on whether previous experience
of change had affected how they dealt with the change they had chosen to discuss. The
majority had been involved in redundancies, as survivors or as victims, some both, and
as leaders, managers or recipients of the process. These experiences had given them
insight into their own responses and those of others. While almost all participants
believed they had gained valuable experience from various changes in the past, their
comments fell into three categories. In the first were those who believed previous
change had helped them manage the change in question. Those in the second group said
that because this change was different to those in the past, previous experience was of
limited, if any, benefit. In the third category participants indicated that previous change
had not prepared them to cope with the emotional demands of the change under
discussion.
In the first category were several change managers and leaders who had
considerable experience in change, as line managers, as human resource managers and
as management consultants. E said that his extensive experience had given him “without
sounding conceited, a sense of wisdom”. Some referred to lessons in better ways of
planning and implementing the mechanics of change, some to how they dealt with their
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own pressures and emotional issues and some to how they dealt with other people’s
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses.
Lessons from the past gave participants a different perspective on how to
manage change: I think the thing I’ve found about restructuring is that you’ve got to follow the planning and
the detail that goes into it has to be absolutely worked out in terms of how you do it, when
you do it, what you say, what you do (K).
I have a personal interest because of my interest in change and transition so here was an
opportunity to continue to apply some methodologies that I’ve used. So personally it was of
interest professionally...it was an opportunity for me to train our management on change
and transition management. It was a good opportunity for me to apply those skills myself
and there were some mistakes…I was very confident that I had a lot of value to add to it
and I strongly influenced the process and methodology that was followed and personally
reviewed all the communications and took a keen role, particularly at the beginning in the
shaping and the design (W).
We had that change implemented in six weeks. So if you can get engagement and
ownership and see the worth in what you’re trying to do, people will come on the journey
with you. They’ll resist cause they’re personally affected and they want some pay and all
the other things that go with change. But at the end of the day, if you get their hearts and
minds, you’ll get their bodies. And I think the biggest issue is to engage people in why you
do the things you have to do (G).
One manager believed that having previously worked in one professional
services firm she was well tuned in to the cultural dynamics of a similar organisation.
Another manager’s experience in public sector change gave her a broad perspective on
what to expect in an organisation in this sector, which was facing radical change: My career has been in organisational structures and systems and organisational
development and particularly in change environments, so I suppose I have been on different
sides of the table. I’ve been part of teams that initiate change. I’ve been part of teams that
have to live with it and been done to. So, in that sense, I can stand back and see the bigger
process… I think there’s a certain degree of comfort in the sense that the basic tasks don’t
change but you just learn to anticipate and read the politics and structural sort of
discussions (P).
Experience in change helped some people manage their own responses: “You
can be quite negative and fall into a bit of a destructive pattern of whatever, or you just
learn to anticipate it. (P); “never had any problems with being quite fluid…made me
more tolerant of the bad stuff than I should have been, but I probably just covered it up”
(B); “You build in mechanisms to cope…work through priorities, filter out what you
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need, put in the hours” (E). Q learnt that a way of coping with her own emotions from
dealing with angry and anxious employees - and simultaneously managing other
people’s emotions - was not to take things personally, particularly when facing unfair
accusations.
Other participants also believed that experience in change helped them deal with
their own and others’ emotions. Of particular interest are the comments of S: Emotional impact at the time was significant because I had to be firm and resolute in terms
of pursuing the strategy I had put in place, but at the same time taking into consideration
the emotions that my people were going through. And whilst I understood that people go
through certain phases, once change has been implemented, when you actually see it
happening, it’s quite tough and so in all of that year where we implemented the change, it
was pretty tough on myself.…Because I’ve worked for this organisation for a long time and
as an organisation we have undergone numerous changes over the…eight years that I’ve
worked for the company, whether through acquisitions or structural changes, name
changes, whatever, I guess I’m highly seasoned in change and what goes with it, and so I
have a good emotional intelligence around what goes on.
In the second category of respondents were those who simply said that previous
change was of such a different type that this experience was irrelevant in the new
context. For example, W admitted that, despite his considerable experience in managing
change, that there were aspects of the change he was currently leading that were of a
complexity he had not encountered before.
In the third category were those who said that previous experience had not
prepared them for the emotional demands of the current change. No parallel was found
in previous experience to the stress of being made redundant (D and O) or being
suspended then fired (V). H observed that the resilience that had helped her cope with
previous change was inadequate in dealing with the overwhelmingly negative elements
of being demoted and marginalised by the firm’s new owners and directors. In A’s
previous experience as a manager in the company, he had been extensively consulted on
change but found it difficult to cope with the sadness and disenfranchisement he felt
from now being excluded. He also noted that whereas he had previously benefited from
change, in the current change he was now struggling with the loss of status and
influence.
Summary of findings and discussion
Previous experience in organisational change thus played an important role for some
participants, but was of limited value to others who faced highly demanding
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circumstances. Lessons from the past helped some to plan and implement change better,
for the benefit of the organisation and its staff, as it helped them predict cognitive,
affective and behavioural responses. For example, participants who had themselves
been made redundant, like N, Q and W, had developed the empathy that allowed them
to address the emotions of those who were to become victims. Some had also developed
the capability of managing their own psychological adjustment. Change self-efficacy is
a personality trait (Jimmieson et al., 2004; Herold et al., 2007, Holt et al., 2007) that
may develop over time through a variety of experiences in change.
Some participants may have become cynical from previous change initiatives.
As Stanley et al. (2005) and Bareil et al. (2007) have shown, cynicism can be
dispositional and/or situational. One-off interviews are imprecise ways of distinguishing
between the two. B’s cynicism, for example, appeared to have different sources -
personality, incompetent and insensitive management - and change practices she had
encountered in the past in a number of organisations. The full quote, which appears in
Research Question 6, is some evidence of this (e.g. “I don’t think I’ve ever known a
change process that added something”). Reichers et al. (1997) found that employees
who had experienced many failed change efforts had become very cynical about change
and the ‘bend over here it comes again’ syndrome conditions people to expect the worst
in change (Connell & Waring, 2002). People have long memories, especially of poorly
managed change and its association with negative emotions, particularly if the emotions
were intense (Talarico et al., 2004). B, reporting on an organisational change nine years
previously, commented that lack of transparency in management actions in a
restructuring and redundancy initiative created “huge cynicism” amongst the workforce.
This could have derailed future changes unless trust was restored. Collerette et al.’s
(2006, p. 164) survey (conducted in 2002) found that a change in the late 1980s had left
a “bitter memory...and many people were looking at the coming change with
apprehension.” In the context of the current study, situational cynicism implies that
managers of an organisation are perceived as lacking the motivation, competence or
integrity to manage an upcoming change - or any change (Wanous et al. 2000). W said
that in trying to manage changes in an organisation his company had bought, he
believed that the lack of trust was due to people having been “deeply scarred by their
previous employer”. Cynicism is also related to perceptions of justice (Bernerth et al.,
2007) and where previous change was managed unfairly, people are likely to be cynical
about current and future change. The level of perceived organisational support plays a
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role in how people react to another organisational change even when, or particularly
when, an organisation faces ongoing change (Self et al., 2007).
In summary, organisational change can be complex and past experiences may
provide people with the opportunity of gaining skills in dealing with future change and
devising emotion- and problem-focused strategies (Folkman & Lazarus, 1988; Judge et
al. 1999). Emotional intelligence, according to Jordan (2005), should help people to
learn from the past and manage their emotions, and those of others, better in future
changes. People who have experienced both positive and negative change, and who
have coped effectively, may still have attitudinal resistance to a new change, but also
have the knowledge, skills and self-efficacy that contribute to the belief that they can
deal with most challenges that come their way. If people remain in the same
organisation they can use previous experience in that organisation to frame their
responses to future changes.
Change and Stress outside the Workplace
Research Question 8: In what ways are employees’ cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to organisational change moderated by changes and any
stress-producing event outside of work?
Participants in this study were directly asked whether any personal factors, outside the
organisation, had affected how they had responded to the change. Very few reported
this to be relevant. Even though M had planned and negotiated his own exit, he
confessed, “There’s always a sense of failure in you, probably when you decide to leave
a job for the reasons I did”, and that it had coincided with publicity surrounding the
success of a sibling. Two participants got divorced partly because of work pressures and
related work-life balance issues. Change in personal circumstance appeared to be in
some way the result of work-related commitments, including - but not specifically
related to - organisational change, and the participants did not comment on how
personal issues impacted on job performances, or their ability to manage work changes.
Only one participant, J, suggested that change outside of work affected how he
coped with an organisational change. The birth of his first child and the illness of his
mother at the same time exacerbated his negative reaction to a work-related change. He
said, “I’m naturally dedicated to my work so it was really hard for me to balance my
family and my work at the same time so you have a feeling of being torn.” Shortly
thereafter these family issues, together with the dissatisfaction he felt about the nature
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and process of the organisational change he was required to manage, motivated his
resignation from the organisation.
Summary of findings and discussion
There were only isolated cases of participants dealing with work-change and non-work
changes at the same time. Conceptually work-life balance issues can impact on job
performance a person’s resources to deal with change at work could be depleted by
change or a stressful situation from non-work sources. The life changes index (Rahe et
al., 2000) indicates that change on multiple fronts is stressful. While there is literature
on how non-work stress and change can generally affect performance at work and job
satisfaction (Wharton & Erickson, 1993; Harris, 2002; Montgomery et al., 2006; Rahe
et al., 2000), none of it specifically covers its impact on work-related change.
Thus while personal change and stress can impact on how one manages work
commitments, particularly those relating to change, further research is necessary to
develop a deeper understanding of how coping with change (and other issues) outside of
work affects capacity to cope with change at work.
The above four research questions have shown that factors within the person
experiencing organisational change combine to influence cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to it. Although specific interviews questions were asked of
respondents to gain insight into the research questions in this study, the nature of
answers showed the interwoven nature of several of the research questions and the
constructs embedded within them. For example, empathy is considered both an EI
ability and a personality trait and researchers often find difficulty in distinguishing
between the two (Kellett et al., 2002; Munro et al., 2005). Previous experience of
change often develops or enhances the traits of resilience and self-efficacy and the EI
ability to deal with emotional outcomes. In addition, these ‘internal factors’ usually
work in tandem with the ‘external factors’ that are found in change players’ perceptions
of their direct managers and more senior staff.
Variables with in the Change Leaders/Managers Moderating Employee’ Cognitive,
Affective and Behavioural Responses to Change
It was noted in the literature review that the employees’ perceptions of factors within
the change leaders and managers - leadership ability, emotional intelligence and
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trustworthiness - have considerable overlaps. In Research Question 9 only the abilities
of leadership will be discussed (not personality traits). The emotional intelligence of
leaders (as ability) will be highlighted in Research Question 10. Trustworthiness, but no
other traits of leaders, will be discussed in Research Question 11. While employee
perceptions of each variable may have been particularly salient for some participants,
the combined influence may be more important in impacting on their own cognitive,
affective and behavioural reactions to change.
Perceived Leadership Abilities of Change Leaders and Managers
Research Question 9: How are employees’ cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses to change moderated by the perceived leadership ability of the change
leaders and managers?
A number of intersecting issues surfaced in the interviewees’ comments on leadership
ability: the positive/negative evaluations, how they differ with respect to the various
roles played by their immediate supervisors and more senior managers, the nature of the
leadership style, and the impact on employees’ responses.
Some of the changes involved an interviewee moving from one department or
organisation to another, or when one manager replaced another. Respondents’
perceptions of leadership abilities were therefore based on different phases of the
change processes and different people. In some cases participants identified only
positive or negative evaluations while others could see both. Some had very different
perceptions of their immediate supervisors and more senior managers. P found that
management in her own organisation “showed huge leadership” but those in the
organisation that took it over “were a bunch of bastards.” Likewise, A saw some
positives in the leadership ability of his manager but considered senior executives in the
holding company to be “arrogant, vain and petty people.” A number of people had
ambivalent perceptions of the leadership abilities of their own supervisors. B, for
example, said that her boss “was a crap manager…naïve…bumbles along” but “a nice
guy.” Although he was “personally really supportive.…I was drowning and nobody
recognised it.” M found his boss to be good in group meetings but poor in one-to-one
situations, the latter sometimes characterised by abusive language. J believed his
manager had good technical skills but very poor interpersonal skills. Both F and L saw
competence in their managers but resented the ambiguous nature of their roles following
structural changes. Some participants, such as A and D, disliked the ways their
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managers behaved but thought that they may have been pressurised into acting that way
by more senior managers.
Participative leadership styles were welcomed by respondents at all hierarchical
levels. Two participants, B and M, were displeased with lack of consultation of staff at
other levels and believed that this had undermined acceptance of change. With a few
exceptions, those who were involved in leading change found that their supervisors had
provided sufficient backing for the change project and had allowed them and their
colleagues to handle their respective portfolios without interference. The exceptions
were when new owners (including those in the public sector) had legislated change
without consultation or had directed existing management to do so. For change
recipients, exclusion from decision-making was a bitter pill to swallow, particularly for
senior managers, like A and P, who had previously been consulted on change.
Participation involves interaction and poor communication of information (often
also seen as informational injustice) was a key factor in some interviewees’ evaluations
of their bosses’ abilities. This related partly to the amount of information they were
given or the process of communication. Some of these views were associated with
perceived lack of consultation and lack of trust in the integrity of their bosses. B was
scathing in her comments of the CEO, who intended to announce redundancies in the
media ahead of the agreed schedule and without consulting her and other HR staff first.
O and X felt that senior management had initially done well to inform staff of the major
upcoming changes but failed to keep this up. X also believed that some staff members
had been deliberately excluded from some briefing sessions. K observed that: Our direct manager was quite a hostile sort of guy who didn’t communicate really well to
most of the team, but I got on quite well with him, but his best form of defence was to
attack and he did quite a bit of that.
Sending out appropriate information helps employees to make better decisions
but also secures commitment to change, or at least reduces resistance to it. Content and
process are both important. H, at a senior management level, experienced anxiety and
frustration when the management put in by the new owners communicated important
information by email, even though her office was next door. V was astonished that the
first he heard of his job being disestablished was in a general staff meeting and M was
upset at his boss’ tirade in a personal meeting. Some acknowledged that confidentiality
issues or dictates from more senior levels had limited the amount of information their
bosses could divulge to them. Listening to employees and openly encouraging them to
contribute ideas to the change agenda can contribute to better decisions, helps to detect
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emotional as well as cognitive responses, and signals respect for staff. Despite other
instances of open communication, T became angry and frustrated. “I spoke my mind but
it often fell on deaf ears.”
Support from participants’ immediate superiors was another factor that some
respondents found very meaningful. This included providing the resources needed,
visibly promoting the change to staff and giving encouragement to the participant. G
spoke of a mutually supportive management team, including the CEO, and particularly
appreciated the peer supervision by a colleague with a counselling background. Most of
those leading change seemed to take it for granted - they and their colleagues were
trusted to manage it effectively. S, however, thought that her boss could have been more
encouraging: He needed to be around more for me. His role as general manager took him out of the
business and so he saw the outcomes and the outcomes were always good but he never saw
what went from here to there and the pain people went through.
As a general manager H found that when one board chairperson was replaced
by another she experienced problems: There was a distinct shift in that relationship. So I didn’t feel that I had any, there was no-
one from within the organisation that I could talk to. I lost that support. Cause these other
changes, to my old boss I could say, look this doesn’t make sense, and he would say, look I
understand...but it’s about winning the battle and not winning the war…You know, we
would have an open and frank discussion.
Many participants responded emotionally to the way their supervisor and more
senior staff led and managed the change, and the perceived EI of managers will be
explored in more depth in the next research question. Before the questions of manager
EI and trustworthiness were raised, participants were specifically asked whether the
ability of leaders of change had impacted on their cognitive, affective and behavioural
responses, but some still wove these concepts into their answers. A number admitted
that poor leadership had made them sceptical of their bosses’ ability to manage the
change effectively, others found that good leadership gave them confidence that the
change would succeed and feelings of satisfaction and comfort. To some extent
comments on leader ability during change were influenced by their perceptions of
ability shown in many other organisational contexts. Some thought that leadership
ability had significantly affected the way they thought and felt about the change but that
this did not necessarily influence their behaviour. D, however, indicated that the way
her boss handled her redundancy “really got my back up, and that is why I got as
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stroppy as I did…I had no inclination to make life easy for him in any way after that.”
Overall, perceived leadership ability did impact on participants’ reported
responses to the change, but with varying emphases on cognitive, affective and
behavioural outcomes. To restate earlier points, comments on leader ability were
suffused with notions of preferred leadership style, fairness, EI, trustworthiness and
other personality traits, and not just change competence.
Summary of findings and discussion
Evaluations were based partly on expertise in the technical aspects of managing change,
but mostly on the leadership style. Participants did not distinguish between the
leadership of change and leadership in other organisational aspects - the one was simply
a manifestation of the other. Perceptions of leader ability were enhanced when
respondents experienced participation, communication and support.
Participative leadership styles were welcomed by respondents at all hierarchical
levels. This confirms the value of participation in organisational change expressed by
theorists (e.g. Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Handy, 1985; Covey, 1991; Schein, 2004)
and empirical researchers (Chawla & Kelloway, 2004; Lines, 2004; Scott-Ladd & Chan,
2004; Szabla, 2007). Participation produces better organisational outcomes though the
contributions of experience and insights from different people (Edmonson, 2003), but
also because it gives people a greater sense of ownership (Dirks, et al., 1996) and
control of decisions (Thibaut & Walker, 1975), and thereby greater commitment to the
change. Some of the participants in the current study were incensed when they were
excluded from decisions about change, other were anxious and saddened. These
negative emotions substantially exacerbated attitudinal resistance to changes even
though participants tended to behave in expected ways.
Communication, which is also a facet of participation, was related to
commitment to change, and the type of emotions experienced. Theorists such as Kotter
and Schlesinger (1979), Klein (1996) and Armenakis et al. (1999) have indicated how
informing staff of key aspects of change reduces uncertainty, increases trust and
enhances commitment, and how employee input strengthens feelings of inclusion. The
importance of these factors have also been empirically demonstrated (e.g. Schweiger &
Denisi, 1991; Jimmieson et al., 2004; Nelissen & Van Selm, 2008; Kramer et al., 2004).
One of the respondents (a senior executive) in Daly et al.’s (2003) research advised that
“if your people aren’t kept totally in the picture and informed and involved then don’t
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think any of these changes will work.” The complaint of two of my respondents that
communication had deteriorated over time signals the importance of the need to
maintain the nature, frequency and quality of communication. However, as Kramer et
al. (2004) revealed, communication may reduce uncertainty but may not lessen
opposition to change if staff see clarified outcomes as adverse.
The value of support from leaders was important to my participants when it gave
them confidence about their roles, the authority to fulfil them and a validation of the
emotional difficulties they were experiencing. If considered genuine, support shows
empathy for the person experiencing change but pseudo-support, which B and X noted,
diminishes a relationship by undermining perceptions of integrity. This was evident in
the case of X’s boss suggesting they pray together and B’s boss ineffectually patting her
on the back when she needed more tangible support. The construct of perceived
organisational support during change (Masterson et al., 2000; Naumann et al., 1998),
has been considered a facet of organisational culture (which will be explored in
Research Question 12), but staff may see individual managers as proxies for the
organisation.
It is interesting to note that participation, communication and support have all
been linked empirically to perceptions of organisational justice. One of the antecedents
of procedural justice is participation in decision making (Thibaut & Walker, 1975) and
in the context of change has been found to lead to greater acceptance (Korsgaard et al.
2002; Kickul et al., 2002; Daly & Geyer, 1994). Communication about change has also
been found to contribute to perceptions of informational justice (Schweiger & Denisi,
1991; Kernan & Hanges, 2002; Kickul et al., 2002; Naumann et al., 1998). Interpersonal
justice is enhanced when managers talk - and listen - respectfully to their staff, and
provide them with psychological support to deal with the ramifications of change
(Kernan & Hanges, 2002; Kickul et al., 2002; Naumann et al., 1998).
Given the wealth of research into charismatic and transformational leadership
(Barling et al., 2000; Judge & Piccolo, 2004), and its relationship to organisational
change (Bass et al., 2003; Kan & Parry, 2004; Bommer et al., 2005), it is worthwhile
analysing some participant perceptions of the qualities of their leaders that relate to
these theories. There was little evidence in participant responses of the mesmerising or
inspirational nature of charismatic leadership (Conger et al., 2000), which is considered
to be an aspect of the transformational qualities of idealised influence (Gardner &
Stough, 2002) and inspirational motivation and which can be heavily imbued with
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enthusiasm, optimism and emotional appeals (Bass, 2002). Since many of the changes
reported by interviewees were concerned with restructuring, redundancies and negative
outcomes for participants or others, it is unsurprising that they did not refer to
inspirational appeals or compelling visions (George, 2000). With regard to some of the
other transformational leadership behaviours interviewees did, however, give examples.
Intellectual stimulation is partly demonstrated when a leader delegates authority or
encourages participation in decision-making, and earlier comments by respondents in
this research question showed how this can influence commitment to change. The
complexity of perceptions of leaders was revealed by Kan and Parry (2004) in their
research into organisational change in a New Zealand hospital. They paradoxically
found in quantitative data that nurse leaders displayed high levels of transformational
leadership, but in the qualitative data it appeared that the potential effectiveness of these
leaders in managing change had been constrained by political, operational, structural
and cultural factors. Some of the comments by participants in the current study also
showed ambivalent attitudes towards leaders. Individualised consideration involves
empathy and emotional intelligence, which are examined in Research Question 10, and
the integrity and trustworthiness of leaders are facets of idealised influence which will
be explored in Research Question 11.
Overall, perceived leadership ability did impact on participants’ reported
responses to the change, but with varying emphases on cognitive, affective and
behavioural outcomes. To restate earlier points, comments on leader ability were
suffused with notions of preferred leadership style, fairness, EI, trustworthiness and
other personality traits, and not just change competence.
Perceived Emotional Intelligence (EI) of Change Leaders and Managers
Research Question 10: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
of employees to change moderated by the perceived emotional intelligence of the
change leaders/ managers?
Research Question 5 examined the role of participant EI in responses to change. A
closely related issue is the participants’ perceptions of their leaders’ EI and how this
played a part in their responses to change. Some evidence of interviewee perceptions of
leader EI has already appeared in previous research questions and the key issues will be
highlighted here.
Positive expression and control of emotions by leaders was a telling point for
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some participants. Of more concern was the way some leaders could not control their
emotions. M, a senior manager, found that some of his conversations with his boss were
peppered with emotive and abusive language which made him feel angry, frustrated and
weak. D’s manager could not contain his discomfort when informing her of her instant
redundancy or his anger when she refused to accept it. While his lack of control gave
her some satisfaction, his lack of responsiveness to her emotions had a negative impact
on her.
An important issue for many participants was the extent to which their managers
understood the emotions the participants were experiencing and were able to respond
appropriately. They appreciated the showing of empathy in a sincere way and found that
this form of support gave them strength in managing or coping with the change process.
This was particularly noticeable in the responses of those in management positions. P
said that the way her manager had responded to her concerns “validated my feelings”.
This form of acknowledgement goes a long way in creating good relationships, and
even if it does not increase commitment to the change, it helps an individual come to
terms with negative outcomes. Leader EI may also have given some participants
emotional capabilities of their own. R was occasionally told to “calm” her enthusiasm.
She did not indicate that doing so constituted emotional labour, and although she did not
explicitly indicate that this was a positive contribution, it seemed that she had adjusted
her behaviour to match the expectations of her boss and other managers without
negative consequences to herself.
On the other hand, a number of respondents were unimpressed at the lack of
understanding and emotional support provided. D thought that her boss had mistakenly
believed that she was not emotionally affected by her redundancy because she had not
cried about it. Some people found their bosses to be somewhat inconsistent. L felt that
the managers she reported to were “patronising in some situations, empathetic in
others”. C said his manager had been surprisingly sensitive given that “he could be a
proper bastard when he wanted to”. O thought that the CEO was “cold and clinical” but
had detected that that many staff were feeling gloomy about the changes. B was also
amazed that nobody in management noticed the high level of stress she was facing from
work overload and said of her boss that he was very supportive and: he’s such a lovely guy…but he’s got the lowest EQ of anybody I’ve ever met…I remember
one day going into his office and bursting into tears and he was just absolutely, you know,
just couldn’t work out what was going on....he didn’t really know what to do really. He
kind of patted me on the back.
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Some respondents thought that their managers had understood their feelings but
had not discussed them or shown sufficient psychological support. For example, S
remarked of her manager, “He never saw the pain people went through”, and that as a
result he was of little assistance to her when she had to manage the emotions of her
staff. D believed that her boss felt guilty about her redundancy and would not look her
in the eye. Others were less charitable: “It was more lip service than true understanding”
(J); “it just doesn’t go in…he heard the noise but he didn’t understand the message”
(M). When X literally cried with frustration at missing a promotion due to what he
perceived was an unfair process, his boss “put her hand on my back and she said I
understand, that’s all she says, and she says, let’s say a prayer together.” This was seen
as a hypocritical and cynical mismanagement of his feelings, and together with other
factors, prompted his resignation.
Participants in my study were asked whether they had been expected to hide
their emotions and gave varying responses (and in Research Question 5 evidence was
presented of how it took some effort to control their emotions). When asked whether his
manager knew how C felt he replied, “Probably not because I’d learnt not to talk about
those things at that level with my bosses over the years.” Managers with low EI tend to
show little empathy or sensitivity and cause employees to hide their emotions during
change. When many leaders in an organisation believe that emotions should be hidden it
becomes a cultural imperative that further reinforces employees’ reluctance to open
their hearts.
Summary of findings and discussion
Respondents appreciated the EI of their managers and others more senior, because their
support made them feel more secure and because it acknowledged that their feelings
were legitimate. Conversely, leaders low in perceived EI ignored the feelings of
participants, provided inadequate support, or even worse, made inappropriate comments
that triggered or exacerbated negative emotions in the followers.
These findings confirm the theoretical position that leader EI enhances the
capacity of employees to deal with their emotional responses to organisational change
(Jordan, 2005; Huy, 1999; Scott-Ladd & Chan, 2004; Chrusciel, 2006). It also
substantiates findings in the empirical literature. Huy (2002) reports on how the ability
to express emotions in a management-led forum was helpful to some people
experiencing radical change. In his research, but not in a change environment, N. Clarke
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(2006) maintained that workshops to talk through emotional issues with sensitive and
supportive supervisors (and colleagues) allowed staff to develop emotional abilities of
their own. Ferres and Connell (2004) found that EI reduces cynicism about change. The
cynicism about change revealed by some of my participants could have been reduced
had their leaders been more able to detect participant emotions or control their own. The
more general empirical literature on EI and transformational leadership, which is geared
towards change, has demonstrated the relationship between the two constructs (Barling
et al., 2000; Mandell & Pherwani, 2003; Gardner & Stough, 2002; Palmer et al., 2000;
Brown et al., 2006.)
Low leader EI often discourages followers from showing their emotions, a point
that was noted in Research Question 5 on participant EI. The reluctance of some
participants to talk about their emotions was based partly on the lack of EI of the
individual manager and partly on the collective EI of their organisations’ leadership. In
their interviews on organisational change, Turnbull (1999) and Bryant and Wolfram
Cox (2006) revealed how low leader EI, reinforced by high expectations of expected
emotional labour, forced their respondents to hide their emotions, and led to higher
levels of stress. When leaders deny the validity of follower emotions they strengthen
resistance to change. D’s perception that her boss felt too uncomfortable to look at her
when discussing her redundancy echoes the findings of Skarlicki and Folger (1999),
Clair and Dufresne (2004) and Gandolfi (2008) that managers of redundancies try to
reduce their guilt by distancing themselves from the victims.
Perceived Trustworthiness of the Change Leaders and Managers
Research Question 11: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
to change are moderated by the perceived trustworthiness of the change leader/
managers?
Trust in a manager’s or leader’s ability was reported in Research Question 9 and this
section focuses on trust in their perceived integrity, and how it influenced responses to
change. Participants reported positive and negative evaluations of leaders’ honesty and a
range of affective reactions. Although propensity to trust others is a dispositional trait,
participants noted the negative impact of the actions of managers who they believed had
acted deceitfully or deliberately ignored their wellbeing. Some respondents viewed their
outcomes as evidence of their manager’s good intentions. C, for example, thought that
his boss “probably did his best to accommodate me, and my future…he wanted to do
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right by me.” Some perceived management actions in a fairly neutral light. F offered the
opinion, “There was no deceitfulness…There certainly was political, manipulative
behaviour on the part of some, but it didn’t go so far as to lead to a sense of distrust.”
Several interviewees indicated that change leaders or managers had acted in
dishonest or deceptive ways. Some comments revealed that managers had not revealed
all the information they could have, and questioned their motives. For example, B
remarked, “there were some cynical decisions made with the intent to pull the wool over
the employees’ eyes.” K believed that a reduction in headcount was a means for his boss
to get a bonus for achieving financial objectives. Q likewise felt that a job design
exercise was not simply designed to improve productivity and remove poor performers,
but was also “manipulated” to reduce staff costs. L said issues of trust made her more
wary. “Is this what I am seeing or is there something else? Is it a smokescreen?
...Where’s the trap?”
Sincerity is a key component of trustworthiness. B was very dismissive of the
“slash and burn disguised as a touchy feely, caring programme” which she claimed
other people could also see through. X viewed his boss’ suggestion to pray to be totally
lacking in integrity. This exacerbated the negative feelings he had experienced when he
had missed out on a promotion due to a process he viewed as unfair, and these feelings
were further intensified when his new boss had “tried to gain advantage for herself and
some of her favourites.” He claimed that management had “betrayed trust”.
B also used the term betrayal in describing how employees felt about an
organisational change. “People were suspicious, they felt betrayed. They felt that it was
another management trick.” Other respondents also questioned the integrity of the
processes that had been followed. M was a senior manager but still felt that “You had a
view that while we debated openly there was stuff going on behind closed doors so
there was a trust issue there.” He also remarked, “I have some personal values that I
won’t compromise and it stretched some of those pretty tight which makes you really
question your own integrity.” He had felt particularly guilty when he had information
on upcoming changes but was not authorised to divulge it.
Broken promises erode trust and create anger and anxiety, particularly when
organisational change has led to unfavourable outcomes. Reporting that he had lost faith
in his manager when he had failed to deliver on promises that he had made, A
paradoxically said, “I think he’s a very honourable guy, and a nice guy, but just these
things were no longer important to him.” U reflected on her experience with a previous
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employer, an organisation which had gone into liquidation. The staff had been promised
that they could have a month to wind up their affairs and were anxious and angry when
suddenly one day the liquidators informed people that they had be out by the end of the
day. Staff, in her opinion, had felt “cheated”.
The emotions of distrust were strong. Participants spoke of anger, disgust, fear
and frustration when their bosses had acted in untrustworthy ways. Some participants
resorted to emotion management - they could not trust their bosses to deal with
disclosure of feelings in a confidential manner and kept quiet. More muted emotions
were generally directed at individual managers who may have been directed to
implement unwelcome changes. He was probably less trustworthy than others I have worked with…Who knows what he
was being asked to do by his board of directors?...He was possibly doing stuff that he didn't
want to do, that he didn't believe in but that you know, that's the direction that the board of
directors wanted the company to run (C).
I had an unrealistic high level of trust before you know. It’s probably up to more a realistic
level now….What I’ve realised is not that I don’t trust him less but I’ve realised his
authority and power to interface with me in a way in which I expect is greatly diminished.
He now has much greater constraints on him (A).
Some participants reserved more intense emotions for leaders at a higher level.
P, for example, was trusting of her direct managers but was vehement in her assessment
of the top staff from the other organisation hers was merging with, labelling them
untrustworthy and “a bunch of bastards”.
Trust develops over time and a previous culture of distrust makes it difficult for
management to regain lost ground. Newly appointed to a position to oversee major
changes, R found that in trying to change the remuneration and performance
management system that she was “dealing with people who had no faith in a system
because they didn’t understand it, they didn’t know how it worked and they didn’t trust
it, there was no trust that anything would improve.” Similarly, W’s company had taken
over an organisation in which trust in previous management had been lacking, and he
observed that: inevitably people are influenced about another change based on their past experiences, so
we got dammed by how previous employers had treated this work group. So that meant
there was suspicion, lack of trust and a number of feelings like that.
Those leading change tended to have higher trust in their managers, possibly
because they themselves had been trusted to manage the change. Referring to his senior
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management team G claimed,“Trust is something we thrive on”.
Summary of findings and discussion
A number of factors operating simultaneously can therefore influence employees’
cognitive, affective and behavioural reactions to the perceived trustworthiness of change
managers and leaders. Trust in some levels of management but not in others will bring
ambivalent responses. Where the issue was important to the individual negative
emotions ran hotter than the positive emotions.
The conceptual and empirical literature on trust has identified a number of key
variables that were also noted in the comments of the participants. First, trust is a belief
that another has acted honestly and with no intentions of doing harm to others
(Gurtman, 1992; Clark & Payne, 1997), and my participants spoke of varying levels of
trust in their bosses. Second, trust can have strong affective overtones (Dunn &
Schweitzer, 2005; Williams, 2007; Young & Daniel, 2003), partly because of the nature
of the outcomes decision-makers can deliver (Morgan & Zeffane, 2003) and partly
because it sends messages about the value of relationships (McAllister, 1995; Williams,
2007). The complaints of betrayal by B and X were particularly damning and triggered
bitter emotions. Third, trust is linked to perceptions of justice - people trust leaders who
act fairly (Korsgaard et al., 2002), an aspect that penetrates this study. Fourth, the
propensity to trust can be dispositional but is also based on past experience (Gurtman,
1992; Lilly & Virick, 2006; Ferres et al., 2005). It was difficult to deduce to what extent
lack of participants’ trust in their leaders was dispositional or situational. Fifth, trust in a
leader may be different to trust in collective leadership (Clark & Payne, 1997) and in
this regard several participants gave ambivalent answers. Sixth, levels of trust may
change over time (Kernan & Hanges, 2003; Mishra & Spretizer, 1998), which was also
noted by some of my participants, as information was given or dried up and outcomes
became manifest. Seventh, trust influences responses to organisational change (Paterson
& Cary, 2002; Morgan & Zeffane, 2003; Ferres et al., 2005). It is this last point that
needs elaboration and touches on the other variables.
Morgan and Zeffane (2003) boldly conclude from their large-scale study that
“any change negatively affects trust” and that this was especially true of major forms of
restructuring, which were associated with downsizing, lower job satisfaction and poorer
work-life balance. Lack of consultation was a significant factor. Researchers have also
shown that perceptions of various forms of injustice have lowered trust and evoked
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negative emotions. Paterson and Cary (2002) found that procedural and interactional
injustice - but not distributive injustice - decreased trust and security. Ferres et al (2005)
found that a combination of procedural justice, support and leadership affected levels of
trust during redeployment. The strong focus on fairness during change for participants
in the current study thus reinforces the extant literature and show how badly trust can be
eroded. The emotionally-loaded term, betrayal, used by two participants, has also been
analysed by Erlangovan and Shapiro (1998). They suggest that not all forms of betrayal
are unethical as seen by the perpetrator. Nevertheless, employee perceptions of
deliberate malevolence strongly coloured their feelings. Empirical studies of changes to
the psychological contract have also produced accusations of unfairness and betrayal
and highly negative emotions (Morrison & Robinson, 1997; Kickul et al., 2002; Ferres
et al., 2003; Turnley & Feldman, 1998; Korsgaard et al., 2002). In a broader context
trust and respect were found in a survey by Lester and Kickul (2001) to be the second
most important item of the psychological contract items.
Trust builds up over time, as Schweiger and Denisi (1991) reported, and can
erode slowly or be destroyed swiftly. Perceptions of procedural, informational and
interpersonal justice affect levels of trust over time as new developments occur (Kernan
& Hanges, 2002). A number of my participants indicated that the information they were
first given about change seemed full and genuine but when it evaporated they became
suspicious. Others found that sudden moves by management immediately destroyed
trust. This has also been reported by Morrison and Robinson (1997) and Mishra and
Spreitzer (1998).
Some participants wondered whether unfair processes had been due to their
boss’s lack of integrity or whether more senior management had pressurised them into
certain actions. Erlangovan and Shapiro (1998) believe that when this happens
employees do not see this as a betrayal of personal trust. This confirms the views of
Hubbell and Chory-Assad (2005) and Clark and Payne (1997) that there is a difference
between trust in a manager and trust in the organisation, and that they often have
different causes and consequences. The relationship between cynicism and low levels of
trust can be a consequence of disposition (which was addressed in Research Question
6) or poor management practices and has both have been found empirically to increase
resistance to change (Ferres et al., 2003; Bareil et al., 2007; Wanous et al., 2000).
To summarise employee comments to this section of the findings, factors in their
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managers and leaders (leadership ability, emotional intelligence and trustworthiness),
produced positive, negative, neutral and mixed responses to change, on cognitive,
affective and behavioural levels. Over a period of time (and not only due to the
implementation of change) employees’ perceptions of their bosses changed as new
developments took place. Participant perceptions are subjective and may reflect
personality traits. People who have dispositional cynicism (Dean et al., 1998; Stanley et
al., 2005) or high levels of negative affectivity (Watson & Clark, 1997) may
misattribute motives and ignore signs of leadership ability and EI in their bosses.
Nevertheless, these perceptions are real to the participants and influence their responses
to organisational change.
Views of the actions of individual managers, and management as a whole, were
often seen as a reflection of the organisational culture, and the specific change contexts
that were prevalent at the time. Attention is therefore now focused on these last two
factors.
Variables in the Organisation Moderating Cognitive, Affective and Behavioural
Responses to Change
Perceived Organisational Culture
Research Question 12: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
to change moderated by the perceived organisational culture?
Organisational culture provided both a context for the interviewees’ responses to
organisational change and for some it was one of the contents or targets of change.
Comments were made about the types of culture, how they changed and what the
consequences were for the organisation and the interviewee. Some participants also
noted the place of emotion in their organisational cultures and how this had affected
them their responses to change.
Culture shapes the way people believe they are supposed to think, feel and
behave. According to L, “the culture was such that if you weren’t an engineer then you
were an overhead, therefore you cost them money, therefore you take up as little time as
possible, but you’d better achieve because they are paying you.” This also became a
factor when change was being designed. A, a senior manager, experienced regret that a
consultative culture in his regional division had given way to a more directive one, due
to the influence of head office management installed by new owners. Conversely, R was
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brought in as a senior human resources manager to effect a number of structural,
operational and cultural changes in a professional services firm that she described as
archaic, conservative and traditional. Her approach of “trying to build a culture of
integrating and sharing and working as a team” was met with considerable opposition
by the senior partners but was strongly supported by the CEO.
A number of change managers and leaders spoke positively about the way their
organisations allowed free debate about important issues - such as upcoming changes -
particularly in the management team. Some were proud that their organisations
provided support to staff during difficult periods of change. Those who managed
redundancies said they had put in considerable effort to give tangible help, such as help
with writing curricula vitae, and approaching neighbouring firms to hire their staff, and
also provided psychological support, both personally and through employee assistance
programmes. G spoke of the company’s development and articulation of values where
people are important. “Our frame of reference was, if that was happening to me, what
would I want to happen?” The way they managed the redundancies was consistent with
these values. Yet D was surprised to find that her employer, which she had previously
found to have a very supportive culture, suddenly found it acceptable to try to make her
redundant with immediate effect, and with seemingly little understanding of the pain
and embarrassment that this would cause her. The cynicism that was evident in a
number of participant comments in Research Question 6 may have been due to
pervasive aspects of the organisations’ cultures rather than a personality trait.
Participants reported that negative cultures were characterised by the absence of
psychological support and a host of unfavourable consequences. Three participants were
particularly critical of cultural aspects of their organisations which had contributed to
their decisions to resign. J said his organisation had a culture of “bowing down” to
customers to reduce prices, regardless of the financial cost to the company and the
emotional cost to the employees who had to compromise quality standards. B had
found no understanding of the way in which she was “drowning”, little concern for
people shown by those at senior management level (but more at lower managerial
levels), lack of trust and instances of injustice. The most scathing was P, whose
organisation was subsumed in a government department. She referred to a “cultural
takeover” where her organisation’s culture “died”: There was a real culture of stamping on any of the sort of features of [our] culture in the
past. It was…big brother stomping on little brother….We were able to take calculated risks
on how we grow providers, how we might pilot particular services. Now in that kind of
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culture that stuff didn’t survive and wouldn’t survive in the Ministry because it’s a
bureaucratic organisation, it’s the centre of government. Bureaucracies can’t help
themselves, they impose processes that completely kill any degree of risk taking that you
can take so in that sense, the culture wasn’t going to survive in that kind of
environment….It was an organisation where a lot of that culture was fostered and supported
by a very devolved management style so people were allowed to get on with their job
within clear parameters. People were allowed to try different things and do things, make a
few mistakes, come back, be held accountable but then be supported to learn and do it
better and I think in the Ministry the command-control bureaucracy was very evident in the
early days. You know we used to be able to give people some delegation around managing
contracts and signing off funding. That didn’t happen in the Ministry. They took that away
and so that has a huge affect on people’s ability to be quite passionate about their role if
they feel they can do something about it but having to go through 10 layers of decision
making to get contracts signed is just nuts.
A number of participants saw other negative elements in their organisation’s
culture. L found it hard to deal with sexist attitudes, including her boss’s remark that
“may the best man win” (when referring to two women), typical of a firm dominated by
men. She commented that the culture of the organisation was: very male, engineering male, technical, not emotional on the outside…a very stiff upper lip
environment…as a woman operating in a senior role…I don’t think along those gender lines.
I don’t actually draw gender lines but there were lines drawn and I had to work with those
lines drawn…I was expected to toe that line always, and it was confusing too
because…sometimes they expected you to be girly and other times they didn’t but you
actually couldn’t really tell when was the right time.
When she cried she vowed not to let it happen again because of the macho
culture that prevailed in a mostly male organisation. However, she did note that she had
worked for the company for over 13 years and that over time sexist attitudes and an
emotionally neutral type of culture had improved markedly.
H was replaced as general manager by the new owners and the predominantly
male management team quickly introduced a very different type of culture which,
together with the diminution of her role, led her to negotiate an exit. One change in
culture was the practice of new managers emailing her from the offices next door;
another was a stronger focus on sales and profits and less on people. Gender issues also
surfaced: …it was all about Friday night drinks, and you know, if you could share a drink with the
boys on a Friday…the office girls would join in, and I would occasionally come in. I
stopped having drinks with them at that point, but the girls were then excluded from the rest
of the evening’s proceedings, so the boys, and that included my accountant, would be
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invited, he wouldn’t attend, but I would never be invited…they would usually go to the
rugby, or go to the races or something like that, and the males sort of went, but all the girls
were excluded from that and I became, I was sort of like the office girls…not that I would
have ever had gone, you know, but...
Perceptions of issues of nationality also appeared to play some part in
organisational changes. O and V felt that CEOs who had arrived from other countries to
take up jobs in social service agencies in New Zealand were unfamiliar with local ethnic
issues. Compounding the problem for both was a different form of leadership style
which was more autocratic and more aloof.
Organisational culture is not a unitary construct - sub-cultures can be based on
departmental, professional, ethnic or gender lines. The extent to which departmental
sub-cultures affected participants’ responses to change in this study was not often
evident. However, B, a human resource officer, commented that one department of a
large organisation had a “horribly dysfunctional” culture, but this seemed to mirror her
views of the organisation as a whole. The earlier quotes from L (also in human
resources) show a divide between what appeared to be a human resource management
culture from the dominant engineering culture.
The influence of the affective climates varied. In Research Questions 5 and 10 I
explored the role of emotion management. While some of the drivers were personal
some lay in the organisational culture. For some participants emotion management was
considered part of the role of the ‘professional’ image of manager and a few indicated
that their organisational culture played a part. W felt that emotional expression was a
facet of senior management interaction but he admitted that he was more controlled
about revealing his emotions to lower level staff. A, a male manager in an engineering
company, claimed that “people in this profession are notorious for not getting in touch
with their emotions” and that his organisation was no different. He also advanced the
view that his organisation has “a very strong professional managerial culture” and this
influenced the way he controlled his emotions when the culture became less
participative. Two female managers, H and L, observed that in male-dominated
environments they had to be particularly careful in controlling their emotions.
Summary of findings and discussion
In some cases, organisational change affected the culture, whether deliberately intended
or not. The emotional climate influenced the way in which participants responded to the
change. Culture is essentially about values (Schein, 2004; Martin, 2002), and a number
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of participants referred to their relevance. G, a change leader and manager, believed that
the ethical way in which his organisation managed redundancies was consistent with its
people-oriented values. His view that the culture was “the glue that made it doable”
echoes the assertion of Ryan (2005, p. 432) that culture, “provides a ‘glue’ and
understanding in that it can help individual members make sense of events and change
activities.” Jones et al. (2005) found that readiness for change was enhanced when
organisations had human relations values. When my participants felt a disconnect
between their own values and those of the organisation they became alienated and some
left. Empirical research on person-environment fit shows that if people feel their values
are incongruent with those of their organisation they experience lower job satisfaction,
lower affective commitment and greater intentions to quit (Kristof-Brown et al., 2002;
Vandenberghe, 1999; Herold et al., 2004). The comment of one of Ryan’s (2005, p.
437) interviewees, “It is hard to accept this new formal cold regime - one that is almost
totally based on numbers”, is very similar one made by my participant, H, who was
unhappy that when her service-oriented company was taken over. “It became very much
about dollars and cents and bottom line and about the numbers…it was all about sales,
sales, sales and aggressive chasing of debtors.”
People often need psychological support when they face change and the
affective climate and level of perceived organisational support (Eisenberger et al., 1986)
influences their responses. In positive affective climates attention is paid to the
emotional needs of staff (Ashkanasy & Daus, 2005; Martin et al., 1998, Ozcelik et al.,
2008) and organisation-wide emotional intelligence is a feature of the culture (Huy,
1999). The use of employee assistance programmes (Alker & McHugh, 2000) and
psychological support can be particularly useful during transitions (Rudisill & Edwards,
2002).
A number of change leaders and managers in my study reported that their
companies had done their best to provide various forms of support to staff and deal with
their emotional reactions. The positive and negative perceptions of the change recipients
are reflective of those in other research settings. Naumann et al. (1998) found that
perceptions of organisational support (together with interactional justice) led to higher
levels of organisational commitment in layoff victims for the period they remained
employed by their company. Masterson et al. (2000) demonstrated that when a new
performance appraisal system was introduced perceived organisational support was one
of a number of factors (including procedural justice), in raising job satisfaction and
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lowering intentions to quit. Negative affective climates have led to the hiding or faking
of emotions and resistance to change (Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006; Turnbull, 1999).
Participant references to issues of gender, nationality and departmental
subcultures have also been analysed in other research into change. Gender, according to
Helms Mills (2005), is one way in which people make sense of an organisational
culture, particularly one in transition. Her study of the number of photographs of
women in annual reports over a 20-year period, and of the technical and hierarchical
roles they played, showed little difference even though the rhetoric of equal
employment opportunity had become prevalent in the engineering-based organisation.
Callahan (2002) noted uncomfortably that even as an outsider - a researcher of cultural
change - she had felt constrained as a woman by a sexist ethos in a male-dominated
military organisation. This partly stemmed from a warning by a female manager not to
respond to derogatory comments by men, but mostly because she wanted to complete
her research work and could only do so if she did not lose rapport with the men she was
interviewing. The literature on emotional labour is rife with reported expectations that
women, in particular, hide ‘inappropriate’ emotions (e.g. Hochschild, 1983; Mumby &
Putnam, 1992; Lewis, 2000; Lively, 2000; Guy & Newman, 2004). These studies give
weight to the views of my participants, H and L, that gender as an element of corporate
culture can marginalise women, even in the face of fine-sounding human resource
policies.
Two participants, O and V, thought that the nationality of CEOs from other
countries was a barrier in the way that change was implemented. According to
Vandenberghe (1999, p. 197), “any corporate culture partly reflects the values of the
country in which the organization is located.” While this is true, it appeared that it was
the leadership style of the CEO that was the more important issue for these participants,
rather than simply an alleged lack of awareness of ethnic issues.
The relevance of departmental subcultures was apparent in the comments of
several participants. B and Q were human resource professionals who encountered
problems in implementing change in other departments whose members saw the
changes as negative. In L’s engineering company HR was seen as an almost irrelevant
and costly overhead. Ogbonna and Harris (1998) showed in their study that responses to
change depend on how much a sub-culture is willing to change, how strong the culture
is and how the change is perceived to affect each group. Some discourses about change
take in departmental locations where emotional contagion is possible (Mills, 2000). An
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example is B’s reference to a “hint of menace” and a “horribly dysfunctional culture”.
When culture changes as a consequence of other organisational change, or is the
target of change itself, it is one of a number of factors that impact on employee
wellbeing. The emotional nature of change requires an organisation to anticipate it and
respond to it, yet as Turnbull (2002) showed, even well-intentioned emotion-
management programmes can founder if the designers and implementers lack sufficient
insight into the complex dynamics. Culture touches on perceptions of justice,
leadership, trustworthiness, emotional intelligence and support mechanisms. It forms a
part of the broader internal organisational change context and its relationship with the
external environment, and it is to this concept that we turn in analysing the last of the
research questions.
Perceived Change Context
Research Question 13: How are cognitive, affective and behavioural responses
to change moderated by the perceived change context?
The 24 interviewees in this study were influenced by the complexities of 24 unique
change contexts with vastly differing internal and external environments. Takeovers or
mergers affected the organisations of a number of participants, which brought in many
new dynamics. Some changes were within the sphere of government or non-profit
organisations, which have different drivers to the corporate sector but which trigger
similar emotional responses. A change in government direction meant that P’s
organisation was absorbed into one of its ministries. In the private sector H was
powerfully affected by a takeover but C and U less so. As a change leader and manager
W battled to overcome the staff’s negative history with their company’s previous
owners. Six participants were made redundant and another 10 managed redundancies.
In total 22 were involved in some form of restructuring which had varying degrees of
impact on their roles. It is unsurprising that negative emotions dominate where the
nature of change is essentially negative, such as in downsizing. Even those who claimed
that change was energising or exhilarating encountered some difficulties in dealing with
their own negative emotions or those of others.
The nature of various organisational change contexts has been documented in
various parts of the findings. Responses to probing of Research Questions 3 and 7, on
ongoing change and previous change experience, highlighted one type of change
context. Perceptions of leadership ability, emotional intelligence and trustworthiness in
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Research Questions 9, 10 and 11, also provided contextual relevance to the personal
experience of change. The role of organisational culture (Research Question 12) was
another factor in the internal environment that influenced participant reactions.
Factors in the external environments of most participants’ organisations were
less evident. Political issues were influential in public sector organisations and
economic and competitive forces underlay a number of the changes that occurred in
other organisations. While the nationality of new CEOs was called into question by two
respondents it appeared that perceptions of poor leadership were paramount. Gender
issues were highlighted by two female managers. Technological change played little
part in the 24 change situations.
Summary of findings and discussion
Participants in my study acknowledged that external and internal contexts were
significant factors in making sense of the nature of the change that occurred, and the
dynamics that accompanied it. For example, they expected that takeovers and mergers
would inevitably bring many changes but were still emotionally affected by outcomes
that were unfavourable and processes that were unfair.
These findings support the contentions of theorists of organisational behaviour
(e.g. Johns, 2006), and particularly those researching change, that individual responses
cannot be separated from contextual factors. The importance of drivers in the external
environment has been demonstrated by Hmieleski and Ensley (2007). Their study
showed that firms operating in stable and unstable environments needed different types
of leadership. Turbulence was also a factor affecting employees identified by Kiefer
(2005) and Herold et al. (2007). Self et al. (2007) studied an organisation which had to
cope with deregulation and increased competition and over time experienced at least
one bout of downsizing per year for a decade. One type of change that may be easily
accepted in a stable organisation may become a much more contentious issue, and
therefore a more emotive one, if it takes place in a more volatile context where radical
change or ongoing change is taking place. Some of my participants spoke of the stress
of ongoing change for other staff, but on a personal level took it as an aspect of
organisational life that simply had to be managed.
All interviews took place in New Zealand. Aspects of national cultures infuse
organisational cultures (Vandenberghe, 1996) and become an important contextual
feature in organisational change, as Pettigrew et al. (2001) indicate. Szabla (2007, p.
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549) concluded at the end of his study on a new performance management system
appraisal process that participants’ “Beliefs and emotions embedded in the country’s
social and cultural systems may have led them to support the change, regardless of their
negative beliefs and negative emotions toward the new appraisal process.” Two of my
respondents claimed that CEOs from other countries did not understand the New
Zealand context, a problem researchers elsewhere have also identified (e.g. Scandura &
Dorfman, 2004; Shay & Baack, 2006).
The relevance of changes in the internal context for various participants covered
aspects of strategy, leadership, culture, structure, remuneration and job design. These
multiple facets of organisational change have been noted elsewhere in the findings and
the literature. Several of the empirical studies mentioned above have sought to
investigate the parallel influences of internal and external environments on employee
responses to change (e.g. Herold et al., 2007; Self et al., 2007, Hmieleski & Ensley;
2007). Features of these environments become salient at different points in time during
organisational change, help or hinder people who are trying to make sense of the change
on a cognitive level, and thereby influence their affective and behavioural responses.
4.4 Resistance to Change
The concept of resistance to change, and its application to the 24 participants, will be
analysed in this section, firstly, because the concept is found in many areas of the
change management literature, and secondly, because its complexity could not
adequately be captured in the findings of the 13 separate research questions.
When specifically asked whether they had resisted the change, most respondents
said no, but on further probing it became evident that there had been many forms of
resistance which were then usually acknowledged. They had constructed it in different
ways. Most appeared to have construed resistance simply as a behavioural response,
which by implication they saw as refusal to do what was expected.
Cognitive resistance to change was evidenced by a number of statements by
interviewees that they disagreed with various aspects of the change, for example, the
form of the change - “I thought a restructure was required, I just didn’t think this was
the right one” (M); the motives - “you had to resist the pressure to make it [job redesign
and redundancy] about performance, resist the pressure to make it about personalities”
(Q); the likely outcomes - “because [instant redundancy] would impact on my
reputation” (D); the viability of the processes - “resistance in the sense that we were
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very clear about what we thought would work and wouldn’t work” (P); the fairness of
the processes - “her father was someone in the hierarchy there so she got the position”
(X); and/or the fairness of the outcomes - “our function was being devalued” (P).
Some of these cognitive frameworks related to the roles people were given after
the change and were considered unacceptable where their sense of identity was
threatened. A, for example, disliked the restructuring and his new consultancy role
because it divorced him from the profit and loss responsibilities he had previously
enjoyed as a line manager. K and his colleagues resented being given a choice of
changing from employees to contractors, or losing their relationship with the
organisation. P struggled with the takeover of her organisation by a government
ministry. Her views of the process, which was conducted with little consultation, and of
the ways in which the organisation and she would have to operate in the future, were
incompatible with a culture and role she had found meaningful. R reflected that many of
the partners in a professional services firm struggled to move from a partnership model
to a corporate model that changed their status.
Some participants revealed affective resistance to change. The sadness, anxiety,
guilt, anger or disgust felt by some was manifest in answers to various interview
questions but seldom surfaced in direct response to the question, “Did you resist the
change?” The links between emotion and change outcomes and processes have been
well documented in the 13 research questions in this findings chapter and the quotes
included there show the breadth and depth of feelings and how they contributed to
aversion to some aspect of the change.
Even within behavioural responses to change there are notable differences in
what participants construed as resistant. Most participants seemed to equate resistance
with refusal to do what was required, rather than reluctance. On further probing, or even
reminding them of what they said earlier in the interview, many acknowledged that they
had spoken out against aspects of the change. Respondent remarks testify to the effort
they put in to debating planned changes and dissuading the leaders from implementing
them. Resistance to change in these cases was active or overt dissent or reluctance but
not refusal. Many managers indicated that although they were opposed to aspects of the
change they only voiced their opposition in management meetings. Once a course of
action had been agreed they tended to view as either a question of teamwork, or one of
professionalism.
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Being reasonably vocal about well that’s not going to work. What was intended here? How
can we happily still do what we were expected to do under the circumstances? So it was
sort of a questioning, challenging sort of strategy, I guess (F).
I resisted the way that it was done and that was when I had a long discussion with the
chairman, and I spoke my mind professionally on several occasions...it’s not resisting it. I
suppose it’s just challenging it (L).
I fully put my case early on…I tend to be a vigorous debater…I resisted it from a debating
point of view and that sort of thing but once it was decided, no….In a business you can’t
have rogue senior managers. They should leave…You need to support the business, that’s
what you are paid for (M).
I spoke my mind but it fell on deaf ears (T).
Several participants who were managing or leading change encountered hostile
situations where recipients were loudly, and sometimes aggressively, voicing their
discontent with a change.
Another form of resistance to change is leaving the organisation. P strongly
indicated that she left because of the outcomes of the changes which were exacerbated
by unfair, exclusionary processes. M suggested and negotiated his own redundancy
because he did not like the nature of his redesigned role. O also negotiated an exit but
was conscious that she may have been targeted for upcoming redundancies.
Nevertheless, she experienced negative reactions, cognitive and affective, to other
outcomes and processes of change.
Only two respondents refused to accept an element of a change. Although D
could do nothing about stopping her redundancy, she refused to leave immediately,
which she had been told to do. Instead, she sought legal advice and negotiated a date
that was more satisfactory. V used a more covert form of initial resistance by contacting
external stakeholders he believed would be disadvantaged by an organisational change.
When he was suspended and later fired he took legal action, eventually won his court
case and secured compensation.
While the focus of the study was on the respondents’ responses to change some
change leaders and managers commented on the behavioural resistance of employees
others than ‘voice’ or ‘exit’. Some employees took personal grievances against their
companies. G reported that an act of arson, and several cases of theft, followed the
announcement of redundancies. W recalled one employee who had tried hard to obstruct
a change in remuneration by insisting, to no avail, on being paid in cash rather than by
direct transfer to a bank account. E indicated that those opposed to a change sometimes
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take political action to support their cause. “People try and garner support in the
backblocks…or solicit others to work…on their behalf.”
Apathy and inertia were other behavioural responses indicating resistance.
While P still did her best during the change process, she admitted that after verbal
protests had run their course she “disengaged”. While A claimed that he felt the need to
act professionally at all times the words he used, such as “disenfranchised” and
“disenchanted” were indicative of his resistance. Some respondents discussed their
complaints with their colleagues but not to management because they felt apprehensive
about the outcomes. X, for example, said that if people protested or even raised
questions, they were considered rebels and became targets, and “a target is always hit
upon.”
A number of respondents showed some degree of ambivalence in reflecting on
their resistance to change. Some viewed organisational outcomes as favourable but
personal outcomes or other people’s outcomes as unfavourable. Others viewed certain
outcomes as desirable but the processes as unfair. Some interviewees could not initially
articulate specific reasons for their resisting the change. Despite many positive aspects
some participants did resent the change. There were those who seemed to accept
negative outcomes on a cognitive basis but resisted the change on an emotional basis,
such as the anxiety of K in meeting financial obligations if he took redundancy or
stayed with the organisation on a potentially more costly contractor basis. C accepted,
on a rational level, a transfer to an organisation that had bought his division, and which
offered more favourable prospects than the former employer, but he was uncomfortable
with a less challenging role and a shabbier office. Despite negative thoughts and
feelings about the change several participants behaved as expected by their
organisations.
Summary of findings and discussion
Resistance to change had cognitive, affective and behavioural elements. The term had
different connotations to various participants with most seemingly focusing on the
behavioural responses, such as refusing to act as expected. These responses add to the
confusion in the change management literature as to what constitutes resistance. Many
writers view resistance simply as behaviour, and even within this area a number of
different words have been identified, such as reluctance, refusal, dissent and apathy. In
the literature review a number of models of responses to change were presented,
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resistance being one of them (e.g. Bovey & Hede, 2001a; 2001b; Matheny, 2004;
Mishra & Spreitzer, 1998; Harris & Ogbonna, 1998; Herscovitch & Meyer, 2002;
Coetsee, 1999; Piderit, 2000). Coetsee (1999) sees behavioural responses to change
moving along a continuum from enthusiastic acceptance, apathy and indifference,
passive resistance (which includes protests), to active resistance (including sabotage).
My participants reported on all of the behavioural modes described by Coetsee.
A number of participants expressed their dissatisfaction with the changes and a
few resigned. ‘Voice’ or complaints have long been considered as common outcomes of
employee dissatisfaction (e.g. Hirschman, 1970; Farrell, 1983). Intention to quit and
actual turnover have also been labeled as behavioural responses to some element of job
dissatisfaction (e.g. Farrell, 1983), including injustice, particularly in the context of
organisational change (e.g. Brotheridge, 2003; Kickul et al., 2002). Withdrawal is
described by Bovey and Hede (2001a; 2001b) as a covert-passive form of resistance but
they do not define the term and therefore cannot be assumed to be referring only to
resignation. In one sense, however, quitting can be seen as an overt form of resistance if
the person leaving states that the reason is dissatisfaction with some aspect of a change.
In Matheny’s (2004) model resignation can be seen as a form of dissenting, an overt or
active-conscious response to change.
While behavioural responses often dominate discourse about resistance, some
researchers, such as Piderit (2000), Bovey and Hede (2001a) and Szabla (2007), insist
that resistance also has cognitive and affective components. Taking cognitive appraisal
theory (Lazarus, 1993; Scherer, 1999) as a basis for understanding resistance, people
respond to change by considering the likely outcomes for themselves, and sometimes
for others, and where these are perceived as unfavourable, negative emotions result and
the changes are resisted. Behavioural resistance flows from the cognitive and affective
responses but is not necessarily overt (Bovey & Hede, 2001a; Matheny, 2004). The
disenfranchisement and disengagement referred to by participants in the current study
fits with the concepts of indifference, apathy and withdrawal in the models of Coetsee
(1999) and Bovey and Hede (2001a).
One reason the concept of resistance is construed differently by different
stakeholders in an organisation is that it is a social construction (Mills, 2000; Ford et al.,
2002). Resistance has conventionally been touted as negative, willful and obstructive,
precisely because the change is designed by those who have power. The rhetoric senior
managers employ shapes both managerial discourse at various levels and employee
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responses (Buchanan & Badham, 2008). Respondents such as X, who said that
resistance resulted in victimisation, reflect the fear of the power held by change
managers and leaders. On the other hand, change managers did not initially identify
their arguments against change as resistance. Their approach fits with what Matheny
(2004) describes as a questioning or dissenting form of response.
Cognitive resistance has been given another title - unreadiness - by Jansen
(2000) and Armenakis and colleagues (Armenakis et al. 1993; Armenakis & Bedian,
1999; Holt et al., 2007; Self et al; 2007; Walker et al; 2007), who take as their
theoretical foundation Lewin’s (1947) concept of ‘unfreezing’. To some extent this
might explain the reactions to change that W encountered when his organisation
acquired another. The perceived unreadiness of some staff, and the slow process of
unfreezing, translated into a noticeable unwillingness to accept the changes. But, as is
often the case, there were other contributing factors, such as redundancies, the need for
upskilling and the ‘scars’ that W believed had been caused by the previous employer.
The model of Holt et al. (2007) considers that a combination of content, process,
context and individual factors contributes to readiness or unreadiness and translates into
behaviours of acceptance or resistance.
The role of communication in reducing the likelihood of resistance has been the
focus of much of the literature (e.g. Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Klein, 1996; Fox &
Amichai-Hamburger, 2001). One assumption has been that information will help to
change people’s minds (Bovey & Hede 2001b). While Szabla (2007) found that rational
explanations of the need for change used by leaders do have a positive impact on the
ways in which change recipients respond to change, each person may have a different
set of perceptions of the espoused need for change, and may not trust those leading and
implementing it. Participants in the current study who were change leaders made strong
efforts to inform employees of the need for change but realised that this did not always
work.
The literature on framing and sense-making provides some guidance. Resistance
to change was often due to the mental models (Senge, 1990; Jordan, 2005) or schemata
(Bartunek & Moch, 1987; George & Jones, 2001; Lau & Woodman, 1995) respondents
(or others they discussed) had of the old and the new situations. For example, R referred
to the resistance of partners in a professional services firm to a corporate model. The
partners had agreed to a change in structure and management but resistance mounted
over time when material and psychological outcomes were perceived as negative.
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George and Jones (2001) believe that the more widespread or extensive the challenge is
to a pre-existing schema the more the change will be resisted. According to K,
management in his organisation tried to frame the move from employee to consultant as
both necessary for the organisation and beneficial to the employee. However, he and
most of his colleagues calculated that the move was financially risky from a personal
perspective. Sense-making can also be a heuristic process whereby a person
subconsciously sifts through reams of information and randomly focuses on one salient
aspect that helps to decipher complex and conflicting phenomena (Weick, 1995).
Resistance to change on an emotional level derives from the negative
evaluations of some elements of the change (Bovey & Hede, 2001a; Piderit, 2000), yet
much of the literature on resistance (e.g. Young, 2000; Ford & Ford, 1994) and
readiness (e.g. Armenakis et al., 1993) is virtually silent on affective causes.
Participants’ resistance was partly due to perceptions of unfairness and this has been
documented in Research Question 4. One of the major sources of resistance of my
respondents - and other employees they referred to - was loss of jobs, benefits, preferred
tasks, colleagues, status, identity and inclusion in decision-making. Loss as a source of
cognitive, affective and behavioural resistance to change has been documented in the
empirical literature by Wolfram Cox (1997), Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006) and
Bovey and Hede (2001a). Various theorists provide support from the emotions literature
that loss is resisted. Frijda (1988, p. 349), for example, observes that “Grief is elicited
by personal loss.” Kubler-Ross’s (1996) grief cycle incorporates denial (cognition),
anger, rage and resentment (emotions) and bargaining (behaviour). Elrodd and Tippett
(2000) adapted the grief cycle in commenting on various models depicting the “death
valley” concept of change in organisations and elsewhere.
Ambivalent responses were noted in the comments by many participants.
Ambivalence can mean a disconnect between two cognitions, for example, the
observation of managers of redundancy that the outcomes would be good for the
organisation but not for the victims. It also meant a combination of positive and
negative thoughts, emotions and actions. In managing several changes, for example, R
and W noted both excitement and anxiety. Some participants who thought that the
changes would have poor outcomes, and who were angry or anxious, nevertheless took
little action and even kept quiet. The fear of victimisation expressed by X has a parallel
in a comment made by one respondent in the study of Bacharach et al. (1996, p. 492): No flight attendant wanted to talk with any supervisor…unless they absolutely had to. They
were afraid of the supervisor marking them as having this kind of problem; putting it in
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their file and then they'd be in trouble - they'd be disciplined for it.
Changes may have multiple facets and it is likely that some will be seen as
positive and some as negative. In analysing how people reflect on incidents and try to
manage their complexities, Weick (1995, p. 29) observes that “the elapsed experience
appears to be equivocal, not because it makes no sense at all, but because it make many
different kinds of sense. And some of those kinds of sense contradict other kinds.” In
her quantitative and qualitative research into change, Piderit (1999) found many
inconsistencies in her participants cognitive, affective and behavioural responses, which
she thought were quite natural. In his research into the impact of different types of
leadership styles Szabla (2007) found consistencies and inconsistencies within each
type of response and between different types. Several emotions can occur at the same
time as people perceive positive and negative aspects of change, as Fineman (2003) and
French (2001) have pointed out. Huy (2002, p. 36) provides a simple example: People who act both as an enthusiastic agent for a change project and as a distressed
recipient of another project, could, however, experience a wide range of conflicting
emotions and would probably need to manage their own emotional ambivalence.
It should also be noted that it is not just ‘workers’ who resist change as is often
believed. There was an assumption of managers in the current study that their role
explicitly or implicitly required obedience or conformity, let alone a commitment to
management edicts issued up the chain of command. Researchers have documented the
resistance of managers to change they find unacceptable (Young, 2000; Huy, 2002;
Spreitzer & Quinn, 1996; La Nuez & Jermier, 1994). Most of the resistance of managers
in my study, however, stemmed from a perceived lack of desired control over aspects of
the change. In some of these cases the managers in question had the role of change
manager, in others the role of change recipient, and either did not participate at all in
decisions about change or were, in their opinion, inadequately consulted. Even those
who could mostly be classified as change leaders operated in a management team where
decisions were made collectively, or where either a more senior manager, or a
colleague, had the role of senior change leader. Control over aspects of the change
process once again became a key issue.
In Research Question 6 the influence of personality was addressed. People who
are low in openness to experience (Oreg, 2006; Vakola et al., 2004) or have a low
tolerance for ambiguity (Walker et al., 2007), tend to resist change. People with high
levels of negative affectivity (Watson & Tellegen, 1988), trait cynicism (Dean et al.,
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1998) or pessimism (Judge et al., 1999), are disposed to view organisational change in a
negative light. Even the ethical acts of well-intentioned change leaders can be
misconstrued. People who lack change efficacy (Herold et al., 2007; Holt et al., 2007;
Jimmieson, 2004) or resilience (Wanberg & Banas, 2000) will resist a change that they
feel they cannot manage. However, dispositional resistance was not evident in my
respondents.
While one cannot generalise from a small qualitative sample, one should heed
the warning of Dent and Goldberg (1999) that people do not resist change per se, as a
lot of popular literature indicates (e.g. Colvin, 2006), but will merely resist a specific
aspect of it. Resistance was in most cases triggered by negative outcomes, injustice and
a lack of control over outcomes and processes. The forms of resistance demonstrated by
participants operated largely on the cognitive and affective levels, and were mostly
accompanied on the behavioural level by what they saw as appropriately framed vocal
opposition.
4.5 Summary of Deductive Phase and Key Themes
The interviews aimed to uncover evidence of responses to 13 elements of change
grouped into four categories: relating to the change itself, the participants, their
perceptions of their managers and more senior staff, and their perceptions of the
organisation’s culture and context. The literature review signalled the overlapping
nature of the 13 factors and this was borne out in the findings. For example,
unfavourable outcomes were often seen as unfair (Brockner & Wiesenfeld, 1996); lack
of different types of justice led to less trust in participants’ managers (Hubell & Chory-
Assad, 2005); less trust affected perceptions of the organisational culture (Fairholm &
Fairholm, 2000); and the culture affected how emotions were regulated by participants
(Ashkanasy & Daus, 2002) by calling on their own EI. While all 13 factors evoked
emotional responses in the participants, they varied in impact, and one of the factors,
change and stress outside the workplace, was noted by very few.
Two factors in particular, permeated many parts of the findings - personal
outcomes of change and fairness. It is therefore appropriate to analyse what made them
so important to the participants.
Personal Outcomes of Change
That people who derive favourable outcomes from organisational change will think, feel
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and behave positively, appears obvious and therefore this finding can scarcely be seen a
contribution to the research literature. However, what is not apparent is the multitude of
factors that constitute favourable outcomes. Are they only personal outcomes? Or do
they include outcomes for colleagues, bosses, subordinates or other stakeholders? What
is also not obvious is the complexity of issues that may result from an outcome of
change. For instance, I survive a downsizing and experience relief. My role is expanded
and I feel pride. The higher salary that accompanies my new role makes me pleased.
However, I am saddened by the loss of colleagues, anxious about coping with the new
responsibilities placed on me and the extra hours and travel, angry about a reduced
budget and being moved to an open plan office, and frustrated by the departure of
experienced and skilled staff. How favourable do my outcomes now seem?
It is the complexity and contradictory nature of the outcomes of change that are
frequently overlooked in the research into, and practice of, organisational change. The
comments made by the 24 respondents in this research study are rich in detail and are
evidence of the bewilderingly wide array of reactions to change outcomes. A number of
key themes emerge.
Firstly, personal outcomes were important to participants because it had a direct
bearing on some aspects of their jobs that were meaningful to them. Frijda’s (1988, p.
351) “Law of Concern” states, “Emotions arise in response to events that are important
to the individual’s goals, motives, or concerns.” Obstacles to goal achievement are a
potential source of negative emotions, such as anxiety, frustration and anger (Parrott,
2002), while the achievement of goals produces positive emotions such as happiness
and pride. Where the participants’ jobs, roles, status or identities were threatened by
change (such as in redundancies, redesigned jobs, demotions or exclusion from
decision-making) they responded with negative emotions such as anger or anxiety.
Where they were enhanced (by promotion, more influential positions or better
reputations) they experienced satisfaction and pride. Intensity of emotion is related to
how important the triggering issue is perceived to be (Ortony et al., 1998) and it is
logical that people tend to have a stronger interest in their own outcomes, and
consequently more intense emotions (Lau & Woodman, 1995), a key factor in the
cognitive appraisal theory of emotion (Lazarus, 1991; Scherer, 1999).
Secondly, material and relational/socioemotional outcomes (Brockner &
Wiesenfeld, 1996) appear to be of equal importance and can overlap. For example, B
was unhappy with a sudden temporary increase in workload and the unilateral action of
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the chief executive which caused it. C’s gripe about the run-down nature of his new
office was partly a reaction to an aesthetic preference and partly to the status issues that
the office were deemed to reflect. D’s emotional reaction to her instant redundancy was
due to the disappearance of her job - and income - but also to her belief that it would
lower her reputation in the eyes of others.
Material outcomes of change can provide people with benefits such as
convenience (e.g. X’s complaint about more expensive or more distant parking),
comfort or aesthetic appeal (e.g. C’s dissatisfaction with the shabbiness of his new
office), and job security (e.g. redundancy issues facing K, O and U). Socioemotional or
relational outcomes provide people with status and a sense of inclusion (Tyler & Lind,
1992). Respondents participated in decision-making, or were given appropriate
information, spoke of positive emotions; those who were excluded felt disenfranchised,
disengaged and alienated (A, B, H, O, and P). Changes in roles, status and relationships,
and their impact on self-identity, can produce emotional reactions.
Tyler and Lind (1992) believe that relational issues are often uppermost in
people’s minds when they consider decision processes and the outcomes they produce.
They assert that status and respect are perceived as valuable indicators of a person’s
worth to groups and thereby contribute to the individual’s self-identity. Ashforth and
Mael (1989) argue that social identification comprises both one’s personal identity
(including traits and abilities) and that which is self-defined by one’s membership of
groups. Identity is wrapped in emotion (Carr, 1999) and exclusion from preferred
groups, which can be an outcome of organisational change, is a source of negative
emotion. When organisational identification is strong, significant change can result in
employees’ identity being “dislodged” (Carr, 1999, p. 581) and disrupt their “searches
for meaning, connectedness, empowerment and immortality” (Ashforth & Mael, 1989,
p. 21). According to Lind (2001), by identifying with a group or organisation people can
achieve better outcomes and: secure a self-identity that incorporates a broader social meaning than they ever could alone.
On the other hand identification with and sacrifice for a group, organization or society can
limit individual freedom of action, invite exploitation, and open the door to rejection and
loss of identity (p. 61)….the person is more vulnerable to being hurt or diminished if
expected signs of recognition and inclusion are not forthcoming (p. 63).
Marginalisation, which aptly conveys an image of someone who is literally
pushed to the edge in a change, and is no longer part of the in-group, led to one
participant feeling “disenfranchised” (A) and another “disengaged” (P). Demotion,
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redundancy and dismissal can easily shake self-identity and participants who had these
experiences reported feeling sad, anxious and angry. Loss of identity is one type of
outcome and the concept of loss as an unfavourable result of change featured strongly in
the literature review (Huy, 2002; Wolfram Cox, 1997; Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006;
Fineman, 2003; Dirks et al., 1996). Conversely, participants experienced pride and
satisfaction where leadership or management of change had added to their reputation for
competence or integrity (E, G) or where they were now included at a higher or wider
level of decision-making (L, T).
Thirdly, while mostly concerned for their own wellbeing, participants did
comment on the emotional responses to the nature of outcomes for other employees,
and for the organisation itself. Change leaders and managers empathised with the
negative outcomes of other employees. Unfair treatment of others was noted by some
respondents. Loss can be seen from a collective point of view. P, for example, gave a
strong indication that the takeover of her organisation led to a widespread sense of loss
and X claimed that changes in his organisation were also resented by colleagues.
Positive outcomes for others were also reported, and these too drew out some emotions
from the participants. However, people are naturally concerned primarily with their own
fortunes that result from change (Vince, 2006) and the emotions arising from outcomes
for others were inevitably of lower intensity than those arising from their own. While
appraisal theory (Lazarus, 1991) takes the position that consideration of one’s own
wellbeing elicits emotions, relationships form part of that wellbeing, and protecting
these relationships through concern for others therefore has the dual function of
benefiting oneself and others.
Finally, given that most changes discussed by the interviewees had several
outcomes, there was a range of perceptions, emotions and actions. Some participants
developed an overall heuristic that the change was positive or negative, but most
seemed comfortable in accepting that the change produced both good and bad outcomes
for themselves and others. The scale of the change plays a part in evaluating outcomes
but even relatively small changes influence the way people think and feel. For example,
C admitted that his comment about his office “sounds sort of superficial…but I don’t
see why I should live like this.”
The role of justice played a large part in the way participants responded to the
change, partly because it impacted directly on the favourability of their own outcomes.
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Justice of Change
The role of organisational justice in the findings and in the literature on change and
emotions (e.g. Paterson & Cary, 2000; Paterson & Härtel, 2000; Brotheridge, 2003)
highlights it as one of the most important predictors of cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to change. Respondents in the current study produced
considerable evidence of the influence of the four main types of organisational justice:
distributive, procedural, informational and interpersonal (Colquitt et al., 2001).
While answers to interview questions about fairness produced a rich vein of
data, answers to many of the questions that were not specifically about fairness, were
interwoven with notions of it. Perceived fairness was related to favourability of
outcomes (Research Question 1) and this has been explored in the discussion above. It
also relates to the scale of the change (Research Question 2) and the frequency, timing
and speed of change (Research Question 3). Managers who act fairly are seen as good
leaders (Research Question 9) and trustworthy (Research Question 13). Organisations
that act fairly often do because it is embedded in the culture (Research Question 12).
Why is it that fairness is so important to people, particularly during change, and
therefore why do they get emotional about it? There are a number of potentially
overlapping reasons.
Firstly, considerations of fairness help people make sense of organisational
change (Weick, 1995; Brockner, 2002). Lamertz (2002) found that people make sense
of events, like change, by discussing justice issues with people at the same level or
higher levels, and their evaluations of fairness reflect the number and nature of
relationships they have and the social comparisons they make. His study took place in
the context of downsizing where fairness issues are bound to be more salient. In my
study several respondents (change leaders, managers and recipients) appeared to engage
with their colleagues in discussions about fair procedures and outcomes, and where they
enjoyed good relationships with their managers they were more inclined to debate
justice issues with them.
Secondly, and returning to the concept of personal outcomes, there is the
instrumental view of Tyler and Lind (1992) that people desire fairness because it helps
them achieve favourable outcomes. Adams (1965) suggests that unfavourable outcomes
are usually regarded as unfair. Positive emotions should be the most intense where
outcomes are favourable and fair and important. L was “euphoric” to have secured a
position that had been uncertain for a long period, but the process that had forced her to
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wait had elicited negative emotions. K and O felt that being made redundant was not
unfair but were left with some anxiety about the outcome and some anger about
procedural, informational and interpersonal unfairness. X was particularly incensed
when a coveted promotion position was denied to him through what he saw as
nepotism. This confirms Brockner’s (2002) theoretical point that people hold others
accountable for personal outcomes when procedures are seen as unfair, and reinforces
his specific example of people attributing responsibility to others for an unfair
promotion process. Greenberg (2001b) suggests that people tend to perceive fairness
when their personal outcomes are favourable, but qualifies this with the observation that
perceptions are influenced by fair procedures.
Thirdly, fairness is important to people because it has relational meaning, a point
made by Tyler and Lind (1992) and by Brockner (2002) in their studies of procedural
justice. Lind (2001) speculates that people use fairness as a heuristic for interpersonal
trust and as one of the criteria for good relationships. Outcomes that are both unfair and
unfavourable also signal to change recipients that social relationships have been badly
tarnished. If one justice element is missing the positive emotions arising from
favourable outcomes, such as happiness or pride, can be diluted, and negative emotions,
such as guilt, arise when favourable outcomes are derived from unfair processes. This
was found in an experimental study by Cropanzano et al. (2000). In the current study
two change leaders (E and M) experienced some degree of embarrassment when some
aspects of the change were not handled well by others. These feelings could be partly
attributable to the desire to protect their own reputations for integrity, and the belief that
organisational decisions, to which they had become party, could undermine the
relationships they had with others.
Literature pertaining to several constructs deepens understanding of the
relational issues of organisational justice in times of change. Leader-Member Exchange
(LMX) theory takes the position that in social relationships, “each party in an LMX
must offer something the other sees as valuable and each must see the exchange as
reasonably equitable and fair” (Graen & Scandura, 1987, p. 182). Scandura (1999)
points out that the intersection of distributive and procedural injustice produces
unfavourable outcomes that undermine the social relationship between leader and
member. This can cause a member to conclude that his or her worth to the organisation
(or at least to the supervisor) has decreased. In the current study B was convinced that
her application and subsequent reassignment to a project group angered her supervisor,
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who retaliated by ensuring that she would be relatively underpaid for what she was
about to do. However, while C was dissatisfied with a less challenging role and a less
appealing office, he believed that in due course he might be able to influence more
senior management to address these issues. More perceived control can result in better
relationships, and where C’s situation differed even more from B’s was that he enjoyed
a better relationship with his new manager.
According to Scandura (1999), justice perceptions can strengthen the belief
whether one is part of an in-group or out-group. She indicates that some people do not
mind being in the out-group as long as their rewards are fair. They are less privy to the
rationale for procedures and therefore less inclined to views of procedural injustice as
long as outcomes are perceived as equitable. However, as several respondents (e.g. A, H
and P) indicated, they were particularly unhappy because their outcomes were poor and
because they had been marginalised by unfair processes. As managers they had
previously been in the in-group, and after the change were clearly not.
Using LMX theory, Masterson et al. (2000) found that the relationships between
the interactional fairness (interpersonal and informational) shown by the supervisor and
the outcomes of a change in a performance management system in an organisation were
mediated by LMX variables, and between procedural justice and outcomes by perceived
organisational support (POS). LMX concerns the relationship between a leader and
employee whereas POS is the relationship between an organisation and an employee
(Eisenberger et al., 1986; Masterson et al., 2000; Wayne et al., 2002). Where
participants in my study detected injustice, particularly interpersonal and informational,
the quality of the relationship between them and their supervisors deteriorated. Being
treated unfairly by a supervisor signals a power imbalance and emphasises the lack of
control a change recipient has. The absence of procedural justice during change, which
may be apparent in a lack of perceived organisational support, reduces organisational
commitment and job satisfaction and increases the intention to quit (Masterson et al.,
2000). B, O, P and X all found some elements of support from colleagues, and on
occasion from their bosses, but far less from the organisation. These weakened
relationships, on micro or macro levels, took their toll on their feelings of self-worth
and self-identity (Ashforth & Mael, 1989). Broken promises and other violations of the
psychological contract, a term which B specifically used, were reported by respondents,
and triggered highly negative emotional reactions (Morrison & Robinson, 1997),
because outcomes were unfavourable and relationships were damaged.
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Fourthly, Cropanzano, Goldman and Folger (2003), Colquitt et al. (2006) and
Mikula et al. (1998) suggest that that an additional reason why fairness is important to
some people is simply (or partly) a question of morality. People with high levels of
morality are likely to be concerned for themselves - but also for others - that ‘right’
must be done, and they tend to get angry or frustrated when it is not. While some
respondents were concerned about productivity or relationship issues following change,
others were partly motivated by the need to live - and work - by moral principles.
Notions of fairness are constructed from the multiple social influences people
are exposed to (Tyler & Bies; 1991; Lamertz, 2002), such as in law (Thibaut & Walker,
1975), education (Mayhew & Fernandez, 2007), sport (Mahony, Rimer, Breeding &
Hums, 2006), and philosophy (Butt, 2007). There are also religious views that justice is
deeply rooted in human nature. A commentary in a Jewish prayer book on the phrase in
Psalm 99, “You founded fairness”, states the belief that, “Although human beings have
concepts of fairness, we should not delude ourselves into thinking that such ideals are of
human origin. Even so called ‘human decency’ was ingrained in man by his Maker”
(Scherman, 1990, p. 313). Academic sources indicate that notions of justice are
pervasive in the New Testament, with Pelton (2003, p. 737) suggesting that concerns for
justice have been evident “possibly ever since the human mind was capable of abstract
thought.”
An interesting rhetorical question is whether all participants in my study would
have contemplated fairness issues if I had not asked specific questions about them.
Some spoke about fairness before the justice questions were asked but some seemed
somewhat nonplussed about the questions, as if fairness issues were certainly not
foremost in their recollection of change. It is also worth noting that a strong sense of
justice is part of the dispositional make up of some people (Brennan & Skarlicki, 2004;
Lilly & Virick, 2006; Colquitt et al., 2006; Moon et al., 2008) and therefore justice
issues become more salient to them.
In conclusion, justice is important to people who are undergoing organisational
change because it helps people make sense of what is happening, and because it has
instrumental, relational and moral implications.
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CHAPTER 5: FINDINGS – THE INDUCTIVE PHASE
5.1 Introduction
In the previous chapter I analysed the findings to answer the 13 research questions that
emanated from the literature review and the model of cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to organisational change. The deductive phase revealed that with
varying degrees of relevance all 13 questions were answered. Two of the factors,
personal outcomes and fairness, proved to be dominant in the minds of most of the
participants. The intention of the model was to be as complete as possible but I was
always open to possibilities that other factors may have been relevant.
In this chapter I explore other themes that emerged from the analysis of the
findings. No specific method of analysis was used. The joint conference paper I wrote
with my two thesis supervisors on Research Question 3, the temporal dimensions of
organisational change (Smollan et al., 2007), stimulated discussion of alternative
interpretations of the responses of the interviewees. With this in mind, I reread the
transcripts, and the tables that had been drawn up to facilitate analysis of the other
research questions, and in particular the observations that followed each table. In doing
so, two specific areas were highlighted that had not appeared in the literature review or
had been given only cursory attention. These are control of the change and relationships
with colleagues, family and friends. These factors are discussed in this chapter, and in
the next chapter I revise the model that was originally presented to take account of the
deductive and inductive phases of data analysis.
5.2 Control of Change
Control over one’s destiny in change can bring about better outcomes (Research
Question 1) and fairer outcomes and processes (Research Question 4). It allows one to
manage the scale of the change (Research Question 2), and its frequency, speed and
timing (Research Question 3). It signals that one can make a valuable or necessary
contribution to the organisation and the myriad relationships it embraces. It enhances
self-esteem, self-identity and self-efficacy and relates to other personality variables
(Research Question 6).
Participants who believed they had a sufficient measure of control over elements
of the change reported positive if somewhat muted emotions. Those who lacked control
experienced negative emotions, which were heightened when they expected or desired
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control but were denied it. This organisational change setting confirms the research
finding of Smith and Ellsworth (1985) that control over a situation helps people cope
with their emotional states. They distinguish between self-control, other-control and
situational-control, the last is where no individual is able to control the event. In
particular, they noted that “A strong sense of other-responsibility/control is associated
with surprise and anger, whereas strong attributions of self-responsibility/control are
associated with pride, shame, and guilt” (p. 828). Participants in the current study did
express anger that they could not control important elements of change. Those who felt
guilty that they could not reveal information, or felt the need to lie, in accordance with
more senior managers’ dictates, were likely influenced by perceived self-responsibility
and other-responsibility forms of control.
The theme of fairness (which has been dissected in the deductive analysis of
findings) plays a part in the question of control over change. Early writers on procedural
justice, Thibaut and Walker (1975), identified two key elements, process control which
allows disputants in legal matters input into the procedures to be used, and decision
control, which gives them some measure of influence over the outcomes. In
organisational settings control over procedures has often been assumed to have been
satisfied by participation in decision-making (Konovsky, 2000), thereby enhancing
commitment to change (Brotheridge, 2003; Lines, 2004; Bartunek et al., 2006).
However, while it can signal procedural justice (Bies & Shapiro, 1988; Daly & Geyer,
1994), and produce positive emotions, participation does not equate with control. One
might feel that one has been heard, and this alone might give some degree of
satisfaction, but this does not mean that one obtains desired procedures or outcomes,
either in one-to-one conversations with managers, or in group decision-making
processes. It is unlikely that satisfaction from procedural justice will balance the sadness
of a negative outcome (Cropanzano et al., 2000), even though it may mitigate
behavioural resistance to change (Daly & Geyer, 1994).
In my study, even when change managers were consulted in decision-making,
their ability to get what they wanted, for themselves or others, was limited by the power
and authority of their bosses and more senior managers. In addition, change leaders,
who almost by definition could exercise great power, often had to work with other
managers, some of whom were at the same hierarchical level. They did not always agree
with group decisions or with an element of the change delegated to one member of the
team. Those experiencing difficulties in various change contexts, such as negotiation
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with unions, compliance with legal obligations, and delivering fair processes of
redundancies, expressed considerable frustration at the time it was taking to implement
certain phases of the change, or their inability to get some changes accepted.
Frustration, according to Smith and Ellsworth (1985), is a natural outcome of lack of
control. Thus while inclusion in an in-group might enhance feelings of the social side of
identity (Tyler & Lind, 1992; Lind, 2001; Scandura, 1999), it does not guarantee
control.
When people lack a large measure of control, however, self-identity is at risk
because they become vulnerable. “To be taken advantage of is resented so much
because it implies that one is…an outgroup member or a ‘loser’” (Lind, 2001, p. 63).
Unrealised expectations of inclusion signal that one has little control or influence and is
therefore of less value to the group than before. A, despite being a senior manager, had
no involvement in a restructure and reported that previously: When change had happened in the organisation, I’d be closely involved in it. On this
occasion, it was imposed. I had advanced notice, but only a matter of weeks, and I was
presented with a fait accompli. So I felt disempowered. I felt a very large erosion in sense
of belonging and so I felt sad about it.
Similarly, another senior manager, P, felt anger, frustration and disappointment
at being excluded and said, “There was a “horrible feeling of lack of control…we felt
quite useless in the process. We…had no control, we had no influence over the process,
felt disempowered and basically just conned.” As managers with a previous history of
consultation, both A and P had expected to have been involved in decisions about the
change, an issue that surfaces in changes to the psychological contract (Lester & Kickul,
2001). Turnley and Feldman (1998) surveyed managers in a downsizing and found a
considerable number who complained of breach of the psychological contract item of
input into decisions. One of their respondents is recorded as saying, “Since the merger, I
have become a number, a non-entity if you will, and of no importance to the
organization” (p. 74).
Conversely, two of my participants who negotiated their own redundancy felt
satisfaction. M did so because he did not like the nature of the role assigned to him. O
found another job and still managed to negotiate a redundancy package before an
organisational decision on her role was made. Having earlier referred to “freefall”, she
commented that later in the process “taking control of a process that was totally
uncontrollable…was a powerful thing for me to have done, so I felt really good.”
Assuming control, according to Latack (1986), is both a cognitive and an action-
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oriented strategy to cope with stressful situations. Using a number of items from
Latack’s measures, Fugate et al. (2008) found that control-oriented strategies were
helpful to people who negatively appraised organisational change. A number of my
respondents, when asked a question as to how they usually responded to organisational
change, declared that they were open to it, and managed it well, but felt significantly
better when they had control over it. R was concerned about having “so many balls in
the air” one could drop, and four respondents explicitly commented that they or others
were on a rollercoaster. While these metaphors potentially contain both exciting and
frightening moments, people who lack control of an event have little impact on their
own outcomes, and the emotions they report tend to be more negative and more intense.
However, there was a key difference in the responses reported by the various change
players - change recipients usually had the least control, change managers some control
and change leaders the most control. E, a senior manager, said that he had not resisted
change because “probably by virtue of my role I am always in the fortunate position that
I never have to accept it as it’s given, I like to have the ability to influence.”
The dispositional variable of locus of control, and its relevance to organisational
change, was discussed in Research Question 6. High internals believe they can exert
control to achieve their objectives (Chen & Wang, 2007). While many of the
respondents in my study appeared to be high internals it was also clear, as Chen and
Wang admit, that in certain circumstances, even these people will not commit to a
change. Several of my participants would not commit to a change specifically because
they perceived they could not control the direction it was taking. It is precisely those
who have a high internal locus of control who feel the most frustrated and disconsolate
when they cannot control a specific change. Le Fevre, Matheny and Kolt (2003)
indicate that locus of control works together with perceived control over a situation in
influencing a person’s ways of coping with stressful events.
Lack of control, or at least influence over change, leads to negative outcomes
and feelings of exclusion, disenfranchisement and self-doubt. Being controlled by other
people subjects employees to what Fineman and Sturdy (1999, p. 650) call the
“emotionality of power” and they note that “frustration, resentment, weariness and
irritation become more meaningful in the context of…perceived powerlessness.” The
concept of power is one of the central themes of organisational studies (e.g. Jermier &
Clegg, 1994) as organisations are often sites where “unequal relationships create
dynamics of dominance, resistance, submission and control” (Kersten, 2006, p. 261).
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Elfenbein (2007, p. 324) has outlined how power relationships influence the cognitive
appraisal process in organisational settings: Power is woven throughout the appraisal process, given that higher power actors are more
likely to approach versus avoid, to be active versus passive, to act as initial causal agents, to
be in control currently, and to enforce others’ adherence to norms and social standards.
Power imbalances are usually reflective of hierarchical levels, manifested more
overtly in positional power or authority, but often underpinned by other sources of
power, such as access to and control over information, or allegiance with other power
holders (French & Raven, 1986; Buchanan & Badham, 2008). The power to lead or
implement change lies at various hierarchical levels that reflect the nature and scope of
the change, and the legitimate authority of the power holder, but the power to resist
change may lie at any level. In the current study, W became frustrated when one staff
member, despite considerable management efforts to communicate the reasons for the
change, idiosyncratically refused to accept a new schedule of salary payments, and
consumed management time and energy before reluctantly conceding. V resisted a
change by communicating the implications of change to outside stakeholders. His lack
of power, however, led to his suspension and dismissal.
Lack of control over processes and outcomes, together with perceived acts of
injustice, can lead to retaliation, such as sabotage, theft and violence (Skarlicki &
Folger, 1997; Skarlicki et al., 1999; Bensimon, 1994; Bies & Tripp, 2002; Aquino et al.,
2001; Fox et al., 2001; Barclay et al., 2005). In managing the closing of a branch and
the accompanying redundancies, G reported that acts of arson and theft had taken place,
even though the company had strenuously tried to act as ethically as possible.
While lack of power usually undermines capacity to resist change on a
behavioural level, loss of power and control have been well documented in the literature
as a source of resistance to change (e.g. Kotter & Schlesinger, 1979; Lau & Woodman,
1995; Young, 2000; Oreg, 2006; Bryant & Wolfram Cox, 2006) and of negative
emotions (e.g. Bovey & Hede, 2001a; Vince, 2006). References to power, or lack of it,
were found in many of the transcripts in my study, and tellingly, among managers who
had exerted more power before the changes. A was unhappy that senior executives
“have power over me while I remain in this organisation, they have power over my
future.” R reported that many partners in a professional services firm resisted change
because they “just thought that their power would allow them to maintain the status quo
and they’d go, well, you know, I’m a senior partner here so I’m not going to do this.”
The perceived loss of power was even more acutely felt when the CEO supported the
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changes. L reflected that during the creation of the human resources department of an
organisation “a lot of the decisions that I was empowered to make, but not necessarily
overtly supported to make, were taking away, in their eyes, some power from those
senior managers.”
The emotions of people exercising power, or being deprived of it, become part
of the conflicted nature of some aspects of organisational change. Gibson (1995, p. 48)
notes that the reactions of respondents in his research study were evidence of the
“power of anger to overcome dominant organizational prescriptions of control and
suppression”. Several of my respondents, as did Gibson’s, voiced their anger to their
managers, as means of trying to wrest some control over a change. But, as researchers
have found (Poder, 2004; Mesquita et al., 2000; Mondillon et al. 2005), power
differences reinforce the perceived needs of some subordinates to hide their anger
towards their managers. Being in a senior management position did not protect M from
being abused by the tirades of his general manager. He experienced anger and other
negative emotions but mostly hid them from his boss. Mondillon et al. (2005) found that
although there are cross-cultural differences, powerful people tend to elicit mostly
negative emotions in others, which the latter are expected to suppress. Power holders
are less constrained in inhibiting their own emotional expression, especially of anger
and contempt.
Those leading and managing change, according to Buchanan and Badham
(1999, p. 615), become “engaged of necessity in the exercise of power, politics and
interpersonal influence.” In a later publication, Buchanan and Badham (2008) describe
organisational politics as a socially-constructed notion. They suggest that political
behaviour is mostly construed, by researchers and organisational personnel, as negative
and unethical, a view corroborated by Butcher and Clarke (2003) and Ferris, Perrewé,
Anthony and Gilmore (2000), and that many people do not acknowledge their own
behaviour as political. Selling, implementing and resisting change require political skill
and the ability to manage relationships with a variety of stakeholders (Butcher &
Clarke, 2003). In the current study, some of the participants resented what they saw as
unethical political behaviour in others, partly because they saw it as unfair, and partly
because it frustrated the achievement of what they believed were their own legitimate
outcomes and those of other employees. A number revealed a distaste for playing the
types of politics required by their organisations, particularly when they could not reveal
aspects of upcoming changes that other employees were keen to hear. Their concerns
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for morality and their own reputations for integrity were considered more important
than engaging in political behaviour, but they nevertheless acquiesced because it was
considered ‘professional’ (Fournier, 1999; Roberts, 2005).
As various researchers have pointed out (e.g. Badham & Buchanan, 2008;
Poder, 2004), power also vests, often imperceptibly, in systems rather than individuals,
and becomes embedded in organisational culture. Committees, departments or senior
management teams often arrogate rights to themselves to make decisions, such as those
involving budgets, restructuring and downsizing, and individual employees may feel it
pointless to resist the ‘system’. The need to control one’s emotions may arise from an
employee’s perception of the affective climate of the organisation (Zembylas 2006;
Barsade & Gibson 2007). Comments by my participants, reported in the previous
chapter, on how culture constrained their emotional expression, confirms the theoretical
arguments of Sturdy and Fineman (2001) and their empirical study (Fineman & Sturdy,
1999) that cultural control can be a negative force for employees.
In summary, the more control people have over a change process the more
content they feel, partly because they are more able to deliver better outcomes for
themselves, and which they tend to judge as fairer, and partly because of the relational
issues they read into the situation.
5.3 Relationships with Colleagues, Family, Partners and Friends
The above section on control of change explored how power differences influence
supervisor-subordinate relations in ways that go beyond the concepts of the perceived
leadership ability, emotional intelligence and trustworthiness that were explored in
Research Questions, 9, 10 and 11. There are other internal relationships to which
participants referred that played a part in their affective responses to change. And while
change and stress outside the workplace played a minor role for some participants
(Research Question 8), relationships with outsiders, such as family, partners and friends,
were meaningful to a number of them.
Relationships with Colleagues
When asked how they had managed the emotions of change a number of respondents
referred to the positive relationships they had with colleagues. In each situation the
participants derived comfort from the support they were given as individuals or the
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collegiality of people who were in the same position. For example, C, who moved to a
new site when his division was bought by another company, said: Rightly or wrongly, I just told them about things. And my sort of close colleagues…when I
said I was going, I was reasonably open I think with my emotions…it's dependent on the
relationship with the people. There's a number of guys on the shop floor that over all the
years I've spent a lot of time with and I have reasonably close relationships and I guess I
was reasonably open with my emotions and how I felt about changing.
In G’s organisation each member of the executive team had a colleague who
served as a peer supervisor and whose support proved meaningful. He reported: I've got a psychologist supervisor internally, inside the company, one of my team. He's a
psychologist and when we're doing our own mentoring and coaching stuff we have
processes of what you would call supervision if you were clinicians. So if there's anybody
we're coaching, we offload that to our reference person every three weeks.
K and his colleagues were told to either accept the new role of contractor (rather
than employee) or completely lose their relationship with the organisation. He reported
that one way in which he managed his emotions was by sharing thoughts and feelings
with a group of colleagues in the same position: I think talking just with other members of the group. There was probably two or three of us
within that team and there were different groups within that had synergies with each other.
So I think we just sort of worked as a group and talked about it as a group and we used to
go up and have lunches and just go through it over and over and over again. I think we
stuck together pretty well within our own little groups throughout the process.
A number of streams of literature provide helpful perspectives on the value of
individual and group support. Some researchers have focused on everyday events, some
on stressful aspects of work, but few specifically on organisational change.
Firstly, researchers into the dynamics of workplace relationships have noted
their impact on job satisfaction, productivity, organisational commitment, cohesion,
absenteeism and exits or intentions to quit (Morrison, 2008; Morrison & Nolan, 2007).
Peers are able to provide various forms of support such as providing information or
helping with extra work or difficult tasks, which in themselves produce positive
emotional reactions in recipients, but of particular value is direct emotional support
(Odden & Sias, 1997). There is evidence to support the view that gender plays a role in
the type of support provided. Men are more likely to engage in instrumental or task-
related activities while women tend to provide an extra relational and emotion-based
form of support (Morrison, 2008; Ashton & Fuehrer, 1993; Odden & Sias, 1997).
Gender differences were not, however, apparent in the small sample of people I
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interviewed. Emotional support is particularly helpful during times of stress (Turton &
Campbell, 2005; Buunk, Doosje, Liesbeth, Jans & Hopstaken, 1993) which may occur
in organisational change. The findings from the current study on organisational change
confirm the main thrust of this stream of literature that colleagues are able to provide
various forms of support that help those involved in change to manage their own
emotions. It is not colleagues in general who provide sufficient support for people. As
Poder (2004) and Odden and Sias (1997) found, people tend to confide in ‘trusted’ or
‘special’ peers, those with whom they have closer ties. Piderit (1999) found that
workplace friendships helped to reduce resistance to change when the proponent for
change was a friend, and that friend had been appointed to a special coaching position.
Conversely, while not noted by my respondents, the impact of negative relationships
and conflict with colleagues, that predate or accompany the change, could exacerbate
negative emotional reactions to it (James, Brodersen & Eisenberg, 2004; Kurtzberg &
Mueller, 2006; Morrison & Nolan, 2007).
Secondly, in the stress and coping literature, Folkman and Lazarus (1988) note
that although they classified ‘seeking social support’ as a problem-focused coping
strategy it could equally well serve as a form of emotion-focused coping. This was
borne out in one study where Latack (1986) found a significant number of people using
social support to cope with stress, which she confirms is both comforting but also a
proactive form of taking control of a situation. Discussing issues with colleagues in a
supportive environment is also a way of verbalising emotional issues. Martin et al.
(1998) found evidence of the value of this in their study of The Body Shop. The term
‘venting’ can connote high intensity emotional expression but can also take the form of
simply verbalising emotional issues. X and his colleagues also used social support as a
form of emotion-focused coping: Sometimes we used to have a little joke and a laugh and talk about some good things, talk
about politics and talk about movies or some TV programmes and try to push whatever it
was, whatever was bad… to the back.
One respondent in Robinson and Griffiths’ (2005, p. 215) study of major change
in an organisation commented, “It really helps when things get bad to have a good old
chinwag, you know, get things off your chest.” Bacharach et al. (1996, p. 489) report
that due to changes in employment conditions flight attendants could no longer socialise
on the planes, and according to one they went “to the bars to bond….Going to the bar
became the means by which flight attendants attempted to get closer to somebody.”
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Thirdly, researchers in emotional labour have pointed out that while expressing
negative emotions to superiors often comes at a cost (e.g. Turnbull, 1999; Tiedens et al.,
2002), a safer and more productive outlet is sharing emotions with colleagues, who may
or may not have experienced the same issues and the same emotions. Lively (2000)
interviewed a number of paralegals in a law firm and found considerable evidence of
what she termed reciprocal emotion management. Strazdins (2002) found that
companionship reduced the stress of emotional labour of healthcare workers and
Pogrebin and Poole (1988) reported that enjoying collegial humour was one way in
which police officers mitigated the negative aspects of their roles. In the current study,
X observed that expressing emotions to colleagues helped to reduce stress from dealing
with customers, while expressing emotions to his boss garnered no support other than
inauthentic sympathy.
Fourthly, researchers into the emotional intelligence (EI) of group members
have indicated that enhancing a group’s EI creates better harmony and helps members
cope with work demands (Druskat & Wolff, 2001). Wolff et al. (2002) and Druskat and
Pescolido (2006) found that the ‘emergent leader’ is a member of a group who has
various leadership attributes, and is particularly able to pay attention to the emotional
needs of group members and provide emotional support. Ayoko, Callan and Härtel
(2008) report that groups with a positive emotional climate, particularly with regard to
the degree of empathy and emotion management, produced less conflict and handled it
better, than those lacking in group EI. Participants in the study conducted by N. Clarke
(2006) revealed how supportive group members made the demands of hospice work
easier to deal with. The benefits of various EI abilities in group settings has also been
demonstrated by Jordan and Ashkanasy (2006) and Elfenbein (2006). While
respondents in the current study did not talk about the EI of team members, it appeared
that their own EI had contributed to the ability of others to cope with change. L and O
both showed considerable empathy with regard to colleagues and provided emotional
support to them. During his suspension V was denied access to any support from his
colleagues by management fiat. “Nobody was allowed to talk to me. I wasn’t allowed to
make contact with them and they weren’t allowed to make contact with me.”
To summarise, when change players at any level find that their colleagues
understand the emotional aspects of change, whether they are facing the same issues and
experiencing the same emotions or not, they feel more able to deal with their own
emotions. In one sense they feel less alone, in another that a sympathetic or empathetic
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audience has simply acknowledged and validated their feelings. The four streams of
literature referred to above confirm the value of emotional support from workplace
colleagues but little research has been done in the context of organisational change.
Relationships with Family, Partners and Friends
Issues of outside relationships arose when respondents were asked whether there were
any factors outside the workplace which had contributed to their affective reactions to
change, and also when asked how they had managed their emotions. A number
indicated that the support of people outside the organisation had been helpful. Some
turned to colleagues in other organisations who might be in the same functional area,
such as human resources. Most turned to family, partners and friends for support.
Support from people outside of work, similar to that from people at work, can
take the form of a sympathetic ear, or good advice offered, or it can be validation of
perceptions and feelings. For example, V indicated that he sought: communication with other people, family, friends…and just trying to find out where other
people could see what had happened to me as being fair. I couldn’t see it myself and I
wondered whether anybody else could see it as being fair but from everybody that I’d
spoken to they just couldn’t believe it either.
Some respondents were ambivalent about how much support they got from
personal relationships outside of work. W admitted, “I would have probably gone home
and vented my frustrations”, but he did not reveal what response this triggered.
Participant A noted, “I think having support from the home environment makes the time
a lot easier. And I think that the level of support I had from the home environment was
variable.” A few respondents indicated that changes at work had negatively affected
work-family issues but that heavy workloads unrelated to change were also contributing
factors. Given that these issues were particularly personal I did not probe any further.
While some enjoyed support from home others chose not to burden their
families and others with workplace problems. R said, “I try not to take too much into
the family, if it’s either high or low. You need to switch off from people and go home,
that’s it, forget this place.” Woodward and Hendry (2004) found a significant number of
their respondents reported that one way they coped with change was by deliberately
separating work and home issues. Montgomery et al. (2006) suggest that employees
need training into how to ‘decompress’ before going home that so that conflict and
stress at home are minimised. However, this may make work-related change more
difficult to handle.
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Some of the work-life/work-family literature confirms the value of support from
family, partners and friends in dealing with work-related issues (Brotheridge & Lee,
2005; Wharton & Erickson, 1993), but little has specifically dealt with change. And
research into the emotional intelligence of friends and family has also attracted little
attention.
Support from family, partners and friends is therefore a helpful way in which
employees can cope with the emotional demands of organisational change, either
because others provide constructive advice or because employees felt comfortable
sharing their thoughts and feelings.
To conclude the inductive phase of the findings, control of change and support
from people other than supervisors, such as from colleagues, family, partners and
friends, were relevant additional factors to those specifically researched in the deductive
phase. Had they been more explicitly investigated, the nature of respondent comments
would probably have revealed considerably more evidence of the type of impact of
these factors had.
It is therefore now useful to revisit the model of cognitive, affective and
behavioural responses to change that was originally presented and comment on how
helpful it proved to be.
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CHAPTER 6: REVIEW AND REVISION OF THE MODEL
In Chapter 2 I presented a model of personal responses to organisational change that
was designed to include as many relevant factors as possible. I also gave reasons why I
was using a model, conventionally a tool of quantitative research, in a qualitative study.
The model was derived from the literature review and took account, inter alia, of the
models of Gibson (1995), Weiss and Cropanzano (1996), Piderit (2000), Paterson and
Härtel (2002), Paterson and Cary (2002), Brotheridge (2003), Kiefer (2005) and Szabla
(2007). It is now appropriate to analyse how useful the model is as a framework for
understanding organisational change at the personal level, and secondly, how valuable it
has been in answering the 13 research questions. It should be re-emphasised that the
model was not tested, which is a quantitative approach, but explored through the means
of semi-structured interviews. Comments as to what are properly mediating or
moderating variables are normally discussed, and tested, within a quantitative
framework, but as I argued in the methodology chapter, the terms can also profitably be
used in qualitative approaches.
The model proposes that change events trigger cognitive processes, which in
turn evoke affective responses. Together the cognitive and affective elements lead to
behavioural responses. While some people may be so profoundly affected by their
emotions that they are unable to realise the implications of their actions, others do
consider them, regulate their emotions and modify their preferred behaviour. The
insights I gained from the 24 interviews gave me confidence that this aspect of the
model was realistic.
These processes are based on the cognitive appraisal theory of Lazarus (1991;
1993; 1999; 2006) and Scherer (1999) which takes the position that emotions are
preceded by, and triggered by, perception and reasoning. Primary appraisal involves the
perception of an event and an evaluation of it significance for the wellbeing of the
perceiver. Secondary appraisal occurs when the person contemplates coping strategies.
There is wide support in the literature for this theory (e.g. Leventhal & Scherer, 1987;
Weiss et al., 1999; Cropanzano et al., 2000; Parrott, 2002; Bies & Tripp, 2002) and its
application to organisational change (e.g. Paterson & Härtel, 2002; Barclay et al., 2005).
Most of the respondents in the current study reportedly managed to control their
emotions, and when they were unable to do so, and responded in what they considered
to be an inappropriate way, they experienced embarrassment and regret. Regulation of
emotion (Gross, 1998) is indicative of high levels of emotional intelligence (Mayer &
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Salovey, 1997; Goleman, 1995; Bar-On, 1997) but also of political astuteness. There
was evidence of the full range of cognitive, affective and behavioural responses -
positive, negative, neutral and mixed - and of the ways in which cognition and emotion
combine to create or restrain behaviour in the context of organisational change. Emotion
was always precipitated by a triggering event - some aspect of the organisational
change.
The model proposes that the emotions people experience during change are
mediated by perceptions of four possible factors that lie within the change itself:
favourability of outcomes, scale, the temporal issues of frequency, timing and pace, and
fairness. In this context a mediating variable is one that acts as a lens in helping people
shape a judgment, “and helps explain how external physical events take on internal
psychological significance” (Baron & Kenny, 1986, p. 1176). According to Zerbe and
Härtel (2000, p. 156), “organizational events affect emotional responses through
appraisal processes.” To give some examples from my study, respondents experienced
anxiety over working out how they would cope with job loss, extra workloads, large
scale change and processes that were too quick, too frequent or poorly timed.
Perceptions of injustice of any category (distributive, procedural, informational and
interpersonal) produced anger and resentment when participants considered the causes
and agents of injustice.
The moderating variables that lie within the employees’ personal backgrounds,
and their perceptions of their change leaders and managers, influenced their thoughts,
feelings and actions. Positive perceptions led to positive emotions and actions. This
lends weight to the two-stage process of appraisal theory (Lazarus, 1991) that people
first evaluate the consequences of events for their wellbeing before formulating coping
strategies, including those dealing with their emotions. It should also be noted that while
Lazarus’ theory focuses on personal wellbeing and pays little attention to that of others,
participants in this study were also concerned as to how others would cope with the
change.
Respondents’ perceptions of factors pertaining to the organisation as a whole,
also proved to be relevant, namely its organisational culture, particularly its affective
climate and orientation towards change, and the broader internal and external
environmental contexts.
Other aspects of the model that need comment are whether the mediating and
moderating variables are placed in the correct categories and are as relevant and
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inclusive as I originally believed them to be.
As to the first point, the location of only one of the mediating variables is
debatable. Is the justice of a change a mediating variable that lies within the employee’s
perception of change itself, or can it be categorised as a moderating variable that lies
within the perceptions by employees of the factors that relate to their change leaders and
managers?
“Moderation implies that the causal relation between two variables changes as a
function of the moderator variable” (Baron & Kenny, 1986, p. 1174). It could be argued
that justice is meted out by people and therefore, in the context of this model, it belongs
in the realm of employees’ perceptions of change leaders and/or managers. And if
fairness (or unfairness) is a systemic feature of an organisation (Beugré & Baron, 2001),
and manifests itself also in change processes, it could be found in the employee’s
perception of the organisation. Yet not all aspects of fairness/unfairness can be
attributable to people. For example, if an organisation is under severe pressure to lay off
staff due to acts of terrorism or natural disasters like floods or droughts, or to a severe
downturn in the economy, it is conceivable that employees may judge the outcomes of
their redundancy as unfair (“this should not be happening to me”) but not due to unfair
actions by the organisation or its managers. Another possible argument is that
perceptions of fairness can be partly influenced by dispositional elements in the
perceiver. People with high degrees of dispositional cynicism (Dean et al., 1998;
Stanley et al., 2005) or negative affectivity (Watson & Tellegen, 1985; Skarlicki et al.,
1999) could construe processes and outcomes of change as unfair, whereas others with
more positive natures would not. Paterson and Härtel (2002) and Brotheridge (2003)
consider justice a mediating variable in their models of change.
However, where respondents spoke of justice, or more particularly, injustice,
their thoughts and feelings were in most instances directed at organisational players,
namely, those leading and managing change. Change leaders mostly believed that the
changes were fair, perhaps not in terms of outcomes for those who were made
redundant, but in terms of the processes and personal approaches that were used. The
justice variable should therefore be moved from a factor within the change to a factor
within the employee’s perception of the change leaders and managers. While fairness
and trust are constructs with a lot of common ground (Ferres et al., 2005; Paterson &
Cary, 2002) the fairness variable is sufficiently distinct from that of trust in the literature
and the interview data to justify it being treated as a separate factor.
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The second point that merits discussion is whether the variables, mediating and
moderating, are relevant to organisational change and are sufficiently broad in scope.
All 13 factors were derived from the literature review and found to be relevant in
participant comments. However, one factor, change and stress experienced by
employees outside the workplace, was referred to by very few respondents, and there is
little other empirical evidence to suggest that it is a relevant factor for most people.
From a phenomenological perspective, however, one cannot exclude it from the range
of factors that could impact on people facing change. The work-family literature does
refer to work stress and family-based stress (e.g. Brotheridge & Lee, 2005) and a non-
work change can be considered a potential stressor (Brotheridge, 2005; Rahe et al.,
2000; Folkman & Lazarus, 1988).
The inductive phase of data analysis produced two extra factors that justify
inclusion in a revised model: control of change relationships with colleagues, family,
partners and friends.
Control of change proved to be a dominant factor in the participants’ emotional
responses. When they exerted control they felt more content that outcomes and
processes would be fairer and more favourable. Conversely, absence of control, and
more tellingly, loss of control, induced negative emotional responses, often of an
intense nature. In most cases participants attributed the absence or loss of control to
organisational actors. This could justify its inclusion in the category of employee
perceptions of change leaders and managers. However, a complicating factor is the
relationship between control and other variables within the individual. For example,
dispositional traits, in particular, locus of control, change, self-efficacy and propensity
to trust others, influence the degree of control people expect or need. Previous
experience (including that of change) may also shape the expectations of a person that
he or she will be consulted in a change, or delegated the authority to manage some
aspect of it. These issues lend weight to the argument that control of change should be
included as a factor within the individual.
The second factor that emerged in the inductive phase of data analysis was the
nature of relationships of participants with colleagues and people outside the
organisation. Where they enjoyed the support of these people they experienced the
emotions of comfort and contentment. These forms of support either reinforced the
support from their managers, or served as a useful counterpoint to the lack of it. While a
few respondents could see a relationship between change at work and change and stress
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outside the workplace, a larger number referred to the support from family, partners and
friends. Both factors within the employee should therefore included in a revised model.
The original model (Figure 4) is juxtaposed with the revised model (Figure 5).
In short, justice/fairness has been moved from a factor within the change to a factor
within the employee’s perception of the change leader/manager. Two new factors were
included. Control of change, and relationships with colleagues, family, partners and
friends have been added to those factors with the employee. While the positioning of
certain factors in various categories may be problematic, their inclusion as factors
influencing cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to organisational change is
not in doubt.
There may also be other factors that influence responses to change that have not
been included. Firstly, the revised model looks at how support from managers,
colleagues and outsiders can help people deal with change but does not include the
concept of subordinates providing support to their supervisors. Several change
managers and leaders did refer to the negative responses of subordinates and how this
impacted on their own emotional responses, including those of anxiety, guilt and
frustration. Clair and Dufresne (2004, p. 1613) interviewed managers tasked with
downsizing and found that they often took evasive action: I stayed in my office . . . I was afraid of being the grim reaper . . . people don’t want to see
you . . . don’t want to talk to you (014)…It was almost like the natural reaction was to hide
in your office, stay low key, not be so visible (031).
Looking for support from victims or survivors of downsizing may be an
unrealistic idea but the acknowledgment of subordinates of the difficulties faced by the
managers would nevertheless be useful for the latter. Support from followers for
managers facing heavy workloads or difficult decisions in other types of change would
be of some comfort.
Allied to this line of thinking, the emotional intelligence (EI) of followers in a
change initiative could enable them to provide meaningful support to their supervisors.
The EI abilities in the model of Mayer and Salovey (1997) that relate to others’
emotions can apply to followers understanding their leaders. While there is a growing
body of research on how leader EI influences followers (e.g. Wong & Law, 2004;
Barling et al., 2000), there is little research as to the dynamics of the opposite direction.
Jordan (2005) proposes that employee EI results in emotional regulation and therefore
less conflict arising during change. Extending this approach an employee with EI might
be able to see causes for a manager’s emotions and be able to provide psychological and
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more tangible forms of support.
Thirdly, the physical and psychological health of employees plays a role in how
they respond to certain types of change. They may lack the capacity and/or the
motivation to make the necessary adaptations. While there is research evidence to
support this with respect to any facet of organisational life (e.g. Kessler & Stang, 2006;
Donald, Taylor, Johnson, Cooper, Cartwright & Robertson, 2005), no respondents in
this study referred to it.
Fourthly, relationships with external stakeholders, such as customers, suppliers,
community agencies, government and the media, may influence how an employee
responds to an organisational change. For example, in the literature review two
newspaper reports referred to shareholder dissatisfaction, expressed at board meetings,
with certain types of change (Ward, 2006; Contact Energy bows to pressure, 2008).
Issues of this nature could enter employee discourses on change. The literature on
emotional labour in customer service situations (e.g. Hochschild, 1983; Rafaeli &
Sutton, 1990) has documented the negative outcomes of dealing with difficult people
and situations. However, participants in the current study made no reference to these
external relationships as influencing their responses to change.
Finally, any aspects of working life that employees are dissatisfied with may
impact on their responses to change. For example, people who are underpaid, work in
poor physical conditions, do not like their hours of work or certain tasks, may be
disinclined to support organisational change unless they can see certain benefits. The
literatures on job satisfaction (e.g. Warr, 1990) and organisational justice have pointed
to the negative organisational outcomes of people who are not happy with certain
aspects of their work. In this study the issue of fairness of a change was explored in
some depth. Fairness issues unrelated to change may also influence emotional responses
to the change.
The revised model presented in Figure 5 includes factors that appear to be the
most relevant to the way in which people respond to organisational change on cognitive,
affective and behavioural levels.
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Figure 4: Model of cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to organisational change
Figure 5: Revised model of cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to organisational change
Affective responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Cognitive responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Behavioural responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Cognitive appraisal of change event(s)’ perceived: 1. Favourability of outcomes 2. Scale 3. Frequency, timing and speed 4. Justice
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the change leader(s)/manager(s)/ agent(s)’ perceived: 9. Leadership ability 10. Emotional intelligence 11. Trustworthiness
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the employee’s: 5. Emotional intelligence 6. Disposition 7. Previous experience of change 8. Change and stress outside the
workplace
Cognitive evalua- tion of potential behavioural responses
Change event(s)
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the organisation’s perceived: 12. Culture 13. Change context
Affective responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Cognitive responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
Cognitive appraisal of change event(s)’ perceived: 1. Favourability of outcomes 2. Scale 3. Frequency, timing and speed
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the change leader(s)/manager(s)/ agent(s)’ perceived: 10. Leadership ability 11. Emotional intelligence 12. Trustworthiness 13. Fairness
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to employee’s: 4. Emotional intelligence 5. Disposition 6. Control of change 7. Previous experience of change 8. Change and stress outside the workplace 9. Relationships with colleagues,
family, partners and friends
Cognitive evalua- tion of potential behavioural responses
Change event(s)
Cognitive, affective and behavioural responses differ with regard to the organisation’s perceived: 14. Culture 15. Change context
Behavioural responses Positive Negative Neutral Mixed
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CHAPTER 7: LIMITATIONS OF RESEARCH
It is now necessary to explore some of the ontological, epistemological and
methodological limitations of this qualitative study of emotions and organisational
change. The nature of interview data, in common with any other self-report method,
produces pitfalls that are inherent in human nature, such as “faulty memories,
oversimplifications and rationalizations, subconscious attempts to maintain self-esteem,
due to needs for acceptance, achievement and security, and social desirability”
(Wolfram Cox & Hassard, 2007, p. 477). Problems with self-reports have frequently
appeared in various research paradigms (e.g. Veal, 2005; Rosenblatt, 2002), including
the literature pertaining to emotions (e.g. Larsen et al., 2002; Mayer & Salovey, 1997;
Scherer, 1999; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2004; Feldman Barrett, 2004). Documenting
and analysing people’s experience also raises other issues that lie outside their
idiosyncratic frailties.
7.1 Depth, Breadth and Complexity of Change
Wolfram Cox and Hassard (2007) have identified four approaches used by researchers
in analysing the past: controlling the past aims to reduce bias and faulty memory;
interpreting the past seeks to reconstruct reality; co-opting the past looks for cause-
effect relationships; representing the past “does not assume that the present is
ontologically separate from the past” (p. 485). At various stages of my analysis I have
used all four approaches.
In reconstructing the past an interview of 60 to 90 minutes cannot capture the
depth, breadth and complexity of a person’s emotional experience of an organisational
change. Even though early on in the interview respondents were asked to describe the
change and the emotions that first came to mind, and at the end of the interview were
asked whether any other issues were relevant, the semi-structured nature of the
interview led them to concentrate on issues directly raised in the questions. Had I
specifically engaged other constructs, such as conflict, power, gender or ethnicity, the
content and tone of the answers may well have been different. More open-ended
narrative approaches (Boje, 2001) could have produced issues that may have been more
relevant to the respondents, but which did not surface within the format of the
interview. Since the model developed for this study aimed to be as inclusive as possible,
depth must necessarily be sacrificed for breadth, particularly in a one-off interview of
this nature. For example, even though questions were asked about four types of fairness
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I could have mined this construct to a deeper level had I not decided to delve into the
other 12 factors that are built into the model.
From an ontological perspective the ‘reality’ of the respondents’ experience of
change could not be fully described in the chosen format, but nor would it be possible
with any other method. Change takes place over time and cognitions, emotions and
actions vary accordingly (Isabella, 1990; Kiefer, 2002a; Mishra & Spreitzer, 1998).
Changes with various elements, and multiple changes occurring either simultaneously
or consecutively, will also trigger multiple responses on all three levels. A person could
not possibly recall all responses. The ‘reality’ recalled in the interview is partial and is
the past reconstructed and re-presented (Wolfram Cox & Hassard, 2007). It might be
different on another day and in other contexts. In particular, the emotions expressed
during the interview may have been somewhat different to the emotions experienced
during or shortly after the change. Mood at the time of the interview may have
influenced the nature of the emotions and moods recalled from the past (Sakaki, 2007).
In his investigation of emotion and organisational change Poder (2004) reflected
that he would have preferred to have conducted at least two interviews with each
participant; the first covering background information and the identification of emotion,
the second to probe the emotional experience and to revisit difficult issues that were not
dealt with in depth before. Seidman (2006) believes that ‘validity’ can only be
accomplished with three interviews with the same person. A. Clarke (2006), who felt
she needed four interviews in her empirical study, took a similar approach. As well as
providing a more detailed account, repeat interviews might also produce more
memories, and ones that are more accurate. (Issues of accuracy are explored below.) I
rejected this approach because it would lengthen and complicate the completion of this
study, and also because I believed that I would gain sufficient insight with one
interview. Completing the first few interviews confirmed the expectation. Nevertheless,
I am aware that interviews on emotions from past organisational changes aim to freeze
an elusive and evanescent reality where it is possible that “the semblance of realism is
no longer attainable or valued” (Wolfram Cox & Hassard, 2007, p. 486).
7.2 The Vagaries of Memory
Reliance on participant recall of events (such as organisational change) can bedevil
interviewing and other methods of gaining information, including the quantitative
(Gomm, 2004; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2004). Perception of an event is a process that
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has multiple aspects, including stimulus, interpretation, memory and retrieval (Pecher &
Zwaan, 2005; Sanitioso & Niedenthal, 2006; Kinicki & Kreitner, 2006). Respondents
may not recall in detail the events that transpired, nor what they thought, what they felt
and what they did. Participants described some changes that had multiple elements and
phases, and expecting them to recall the issues, let alone the attendant emotions, is
unrealistic. Selective attention or perception depends on a variety of factors, among
them being salience (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2006; Tierney, 2003), which means the
stimulus stands out, because of its meaningfulness and because of people’s tendencies
to recall experience that enhance self-concept (Sanitioso & Niedenthal, 2006). In the
context of organisational change, some employees may pick up on cues that alert them
to important aspects of the change, while others may not. An additional point is that
over time memory tends to fade (Arksey & Knight, 1999). Some interviewees chose to
focus on a change event that happened several years before the interview and this may
have undermined the accuracy of their memories.
While the ability of people to recall details over a long period can be a problem,
Talarico et al. (2004) found that emotional intensity does enhance memory. My
participants often had very clear memories of what transpired in the past, including two
people who had no difficulty recapturing redundancies that occurred seven and nine
years before the interviews, and another had vivid recollections of a variety of change
events and emotions up to 14 years prior to the interview. Participants in the study on
emotions and organisational change by Bryant and Wolfram Cox (2006) were also able
to recall events and the accompanying emotions years after they occurred. It is an
interesting point that events of an emotional nature have the potential to enhance
people’s capacity for retention and recall, probably because of the powerful impact that
they had - and might still have (Lemonick, 2007; Barclay et al., 2005; Frijda, 2000). My
interviewees were gently probed to confirm the accuracy of their recall. Part of the
interview protocol provided participants with the opportunity of commenting on the
accuracy of the transcript, and to add to or amend details as they saw fit. Had they
chosen to do so accuracy of recall would possibly have been greater.
7.3 Openness and Honesty
I was concerned whether people would talk openly and honestly about their feelings,
which are usually private and sensitive (Brannen, 1988; Lee, 1993; Arksey & Knight,
1999; Holloway & Jefferson, 2000). Some of the feelings may show negative aspects of
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an interviewee’s personality or behaviour and a person may seek to disguise them
(Holloway & Jefferson, 2000). However, participants were expressly told, both by the
consultant who approached them on my behalf, and by me, that the main topic of
discussion was the emotions of change. One can therefore assume that people were
willing to talk about their emotions (and their antecedents and consequences), but not
necessarily fully. Interviews were also handled with empathy and sensitivity and the
ethical guidelines advocated by Brannen (1988), Lee (1993) and Arksey and Knight
(1999) were noted and followed. Participants were not pushed on emotional issues, and
if I sensed they did not want to talk on a certain point, I did not insist.
I could not adequately assess whether respondents were being honest in their
replies or whether they were trying to make a good impression (Gomm, 2004). These
doubts are an almost inevitable outcome of any form of qualitative research but my
overriding, perhaps naïve and ‘romantic’ view (Alvesson, 2003), is that respondents
were acting with integrity and were not deliberately trying to deceive me. Answers
appeared honest and forthright, even when they were not particularly flattering.
Respondents who cried in organisational exchanges had been somewhat embarrassed at
the time this had happened but did not seem embarrassed to recount these experiences
in the interview. Related concerns to that of honesty are the possibilities of attribution
errors and self-serving bias.
7.4 Attribution Errors and Self-Serving Bias
The fundamental attribution error is a tendency for people to overestimate the role of
personal factors in others’ behaviour and underestimate external factors (Langdridge &
Butt, 2004). A related concept, the self-serving bias (Gomm, 2004), occurs where
people recall information that casts them in a favourable light (Veal, 2005). Successes
are usually attributed to the perceiver while failures are often considered the fault of
others. This may be an unconscious tendency that operates as a defence mechanism or it
could be a deliberate attempt at impression management. Gomm (2004) identifies other
potential biases. A co-operation bias persuades the respondent to give an answer even
when he/she does not have the right answer; a social desirability bias leads to answers
that the respondent believes are socially correct; and an acquiescence bias results in an
answer that the respondent thinks the interviewer wishes to hear, and not the true
answer, which the respondent is unwilling to provide. These concerns go the heart of
the debate on epistemology - how do researchers construct and present the ‘truth’? By
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querying participants’ statements the interviewer may get the interviewee to reflect on
both the accuracy and the honesty of the statements made, but most times cannot be
sure of either. Gomm (2004) went to unusual lengths with one interviewee, by
conducting further investigation unbeknown to the interviewee, which he admitted was
not his normal method, and found that the respondent had not given truthful answers to
some of the questions. He was unsure whether the person had been deliberately lying or
had unconsciously constructed events with a self-serving bias. My research study
involved people from different organisations. It was therefore not feasible to obtain
corroborating or contradictory views, nor was this necessary for the purposes of this
study. Therefore, together with most other interviewers, I cannot be sure that
respondents saw matters accurately or were being truthful.
7.5 Inconsistency and Contradiction
People often provide inconsistent responses or contradict themselves (Cresswell, 1998;
Deetz, 1996). For example, B said that her manager was a “great guy” and “the loveliest
man” who was very supportive, but who nevertheless has “the lowest EQ of anybody
I’ve ever met” and who allowed her to work “80 to 90 hours per week” without
recognising the huge emotional cost. Kvale (1996) claims that the process of ensuring
the reliability in interviews is to check whether participants are consistent in what they
say, and that the use of leading questions, while usually considered to be a problem, can
aid in verification of statements.
One assumes that people are mostly logical in their analysis of certain events
and will demonstrate consistency in their responses to questions. But, as Alvesson and
Deetz (2000, p. 74) suggest, “When inconsistency appears it may be an outcome of the
interviewee wanting to avoid repetitions, adding nuances or complexities.” While it is
also conceivable that people forget what they said earlier, another possible explanation
is that different facets of an organisational change triggered different thoughts and
different emotions, and they may have recalled one aspect of a change while being
questioned on another. When contradictions seemed to have emerged I followed up with
further questions, in line with Holloway and Jefferson (2000, p. 27), who indicate in
their text on qualitative approaches that in their own research “There were constant
invitations to explain actions and feelings, motivated by our pursuit of contradictions,
inconsistencies and the ‘irrational explanation.’” However, it also needs to be
acknowledged that some of these inconsistencies only became apparent in the process of
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data analysis and were not followed up with the respondent.
7.6 Ability to Label and Articulate Emotions
A concern is the accuracy with which respondents were able to label and articulate the
emotions they experienced in the planning and implementation phases of an
organisational change event, and the aftermath. Many of my participants struggled to
put words to the emotions they acknowledged experiencing. For example, Y said, “I’m
not going to be very good at answering these emotion questions because I just can’t
remember, can’t differentiate it, I can’t identify what it is really.” Some referred to
cognitions rather than emotions, which is unsurprising given the ambiguous nature of
the question, How did you feel about it? For example, a respondent might reply, “I felt
the restructuring was not a good idea because it did not improve business outcomes.”
And do lay people know the difference between shame and embarrassment, between
anxiety and fear, between envy and jealousy? To minimise these risks I asked questions
to finetune participants’ understanding of the terms used.
Commenting on methodological issues in studies of emotions in organisations,
Sturdy (2003, p. 81) suggests that emotions have often been construed as “especially
elusive - private, intangible, transient, unmanageable and even ‘unknowable’”. He goes
on to say that “feelings are real, but cannot always be observed, identified, controlled, or
labelled” (p. 82). Gubrium and Holstein (1997, p. 65) advise that “Since emotional
experience is often buried, mysterious and inarticulate, questions and answers can often
miss what the respondent actually feels ‘deep down’”. Fineman (2004) also points out
that feelings are sometimes difficult to express or categorise. Respondents who are high
in emotional intelligence (Mayer & Salovey, 1997), and who also have good memories,
will be more able to identify and label their own emotions and recall how they managed
their feelings.
It is important to note that the EI of the participants at the time of the change
may not have been the same as at the time of the interview. General or cognitive
intelligence is amenable to change and growth (Roberts et al., 2001) and so too is EI.
Some of the interviews were conducted years after the changes took place and the EI of
the respondents could easily have increased with experience, training and other forms of
learning (N. Clarke, 2006; Jordan, 2005; Jordan et al., 2002b; Mayer & Salovey, 1997).
B admitted, “I wasn’t as emotionally mature then as I probably needed to be for the
role”, but appeared in the interview (nine years after the change) to have developed
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considerable insight into her own EI and that of others. She was familiar with the term
EI and raised it of her own volition in the course of the interview with respect to one of
her previous managers. S indicated that her experience with organisational change had
given her “a good emotional intelligence around what goes on.” The ability to articulate
emotional experience in the interview process helps to shape the individual’s
retrospective and socially-influenced construction of reality and this may have been
different to the level of EI possessed at the time of the change.
7.7 Qualitative Investigations of Emotional Intelligence (EI) and Personality
In the literature review I noted that qualitative studies in EI and personality were
extremely rare. Research into both constructs has been overwhelmingly quantitative in
nature with apparently only two qualitative studies in EI (Akerjordet & Severinsson,
2004; N. Clarke, 2006), neither of which was about change, and possibly one in
personality (Ablett & Jones, 2007), where issues of change were peripheral. Apart from
the inherent differences between quantitative and qualitative research (Guba, 1990;
Denzin & Lincoln, 2005a), qualitative research into EI and personality presents
particular challenges, which is possibly why they have so seldom been subjected to
qualitative treatments.
EI is considered as ability (e.g. Mayer & Salovey; McEnrue & Groves, 2006;
Jordan et al., 2002b) and/or as personality (e.g. Goleman, 1995; Bar-On, 1997; Tett et
al, 2005) and both have conventionally been tested psychometrically (McEnrue &
Groves, 2006; Engler, 2003). The literatures on EI and personality are replete with
warnings that self-reports are one-sided, inaccurate and subjected to self-serving bias
and other weaknesses (e.g. Davies et al., 1998; Wilhelm, 2005; Hofstee, 1994; Petrides
& Furnham, 2000; Briggs, 2005). In terms of EI the MSCEIT (Mayer et al., 2004)
differs from other instruments in that it compares self-reports of ability to expert and
consensus scoring (Mayer et al., 2004; McEnrue & Groves, 2006), thereby reducing the
weaknesses of self-reports.
Regardless of discussion of accuracy and objectivity, Fineman (2004, p. 270)
objects to the quantitative paradigm “where people come to be ‘captured’ in an
emotional ‘number’ that can bear but crude resemblance to the complexities of their
own affective life.” But while qualitative researchers have explored the experience of
emotion in organisational life, and organisational change, they have not explicitly
focused on EI.
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Puzzled as to the lack of qualitative research into EI I emailed a number of well-
known researchers with a query as to whether EI could be explored with a qualitative
methodology. All agreed that this could be done. (Their names and publications appear
in the reference list, but since I did not seek their permission to use their names in this
regard, I will refrain from doing so here.) The researchers who have used interviews
(Akerjordet & Severinsson, 2004) and focus groups (N. Clarke, 2006) to research EI
have produced some useful reflections on how EI made their respondents more
competent and reflective health care professionals. As part of their research into the
development of EI in leaders, Groves et al. (2008) required participants to conduct an
interview with a manager (or a non-native resident of the USA). Naturally the goal here
was enhancing EI not ‘measuring’ or analysing the EI of the interviewee.
Social scientists have shied away from investigating intelligence from a
subjective point of view, preferring, it seems, to seek refuge in the “socially constructed,
collusive, comfort in numbers” (Fineman (2004, p. 724). Subjective determinations of
intelligence, cognitive or emotional, are anathema to psychology, in any branch. Testing
of cognitive or general intelligence has itself proved to be controversial for various
reasons, including cultural bias and weaknesses in methodology (Westen, Burton &
Kowalski, 2006; Sternberg, 2004), even with the use of well-known and scientifically
validated instruments. Investigating EI (or any other form of intelligence) through
qualitative means would seriously call into question the qualifications and experience of
the interviewer, the nature of questions asked, the approach used to evaluate the
responses, and so on - dangerous territory for the researcher.
In contrast, the use of published psychometric instruments that have been found
to measure up to the yardsticks of validity, reliability and objectivity, is generally
deemed to be the only acceptable approach. Broadly speaking, “The empirical materials
produced by the softer, interpretive methods are regarded by many quantitative
researchers as unreliable, impressionistic and not objective” (Denzin & Lincoln, 1994,
p. 5), particularly when it comes to the subject of intelligence, emotional or cognitive.
Yet qualitative researchers have always designed, tried, promoted and defended new
research methodologies and what was once frowned on has often later become
acceptable (Denzin & Lincoln, 2005a).
Two facets of EI have been presented in this study. In Research Question 5 I
explored people’s own EI and in Research Question 10 it was the EI of leaders and
managers of change. The question arises as to whether emotional ability can be
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competently addressed in an interview format. My goal was not to obtain a full picture
of the EI of participants or their change leaders/managers. This would have required
questions specifically geared to each of the 16 abilities found in the preferred Mayer and
Salovey (1997) model. In a previous paper (Smollan, 2006a) I speculated how a number
of these abilities could be of use to all change players, and in this study found
compelling evidence of what I believed was EI. However, this could not be adequately
researched in an interview that included 11 other factors underlying emotional
responses to change.
My goal in Research Question 5 was to see whether the EI of participants helped
them to be aware of and regulate their own emotions during organisational change. I
asked them whether they had been expected to show or hide emotions during change,
and how they had managed their own emotions and those of others. Jordan et al.
(2002a) propose that EI at all four levels in the Mayer and Salovey model helps people
deal with perceptions of job insecurity that arise from organisational change. My change
recipients who faced this type of uncertainty showed evidence that they were aware of
their emotions and were generally able to manage the anxieties they felt, together with
the anger some experienced from feelings of betrayal. Where change leaders and
managers were aware of others’ levels of anxiety or anger they often managed to use
this insight to respond suitably. As a methodological approach it is clear that my
selection and interpretation of quotes about the EI of the participants is subjective.
Readers, too, are free to make their own subjective judgements, based on my selection
and interpretation of quotes, whether this is indeed evidence of EI during organisational
change.
My goals in Research Question 10 were to find out if participants believed their
change leaders or managers had been sensitive to the needs of the participants (and
possibly others involved), but, more importantly, how this level of EI had impacted on
the participants’ own responses. Once again, I am satisfied that elements of EI did play
a substantial part. It could be argued, however, that if a participant is low in EI he/she
may not have the ability to judge the EI of others. Nevertheless, it is the perception of
leader EI by the participant, rather than the actual EI of the participant, that is of interest
in this research question.
Similar ontological, epistemological and methodological issues characterise
research into personality in which two opposing approaches have been used, the
psychometric and the psychodynamic (Winter & Barenbaum, 1999; Engler, 2003;
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Leary, 2005). In the dominant positivist paradigm similar issues with respect to self-
reports that confound research into EI were found in personality research (Westen &
Gabbard, 1999; Hofstee, 1994; Petrides & Furnham, 2000). Pervin (1999, p. 691)
advises that there are “serious questions about the use of self-report data as a foundation
for a science of personality” but suggests that their utility should not be discounted. The
use of the reports of others (Pervin, 1999; Hofstee, 1994) does provide alternative
perspectives but it is also clear that unless they are well trained, observers may not have
the ability or insight to make meaningful statements about the behaviour, let alone the
personality, of other people.
At the other end of the spectrum of personality research are the psychoanalytical
and psychodynamic approaches. According to Winter and Barenbaum (1999, p. 7),
“Mainstream psychologists ignored or criticised biographical and case study methods
and were (at least initially) quite hostile towards psychoanalysis.” Shaver and
Mikulincer (2004, p. 23) suggest that what they term the eclipse of psychodynamic
theories of personality was partly because “it was difficult to create valid measurement
techniques and obtain unambiguous empirical evidence for psychodynamic
propositions.” They do however refer to a renaissance of this line of research and others
have indicated that the use of multiple methods would do a service to research into
psychology (Kelle, 2006; Hanson, Creswell, Clark, Plano, Petska & Creswell, 2005).
In understanding how a person copes with stressful events Lazarus (2006, p. 42)
advises that: Personality research should move beyond cross-sectional designs, and efforts should be
made to produce a rich, full, contextual portrait of our research participants. I assert that we
need to go back to a much more idiographic perspective and seek rich in-depth descriptions
of the lives of individuals over time and diverse conditions.
Yet researchers do not seem comfortable with the interview approach, as
opposed to psychoanalytical approaches, which involve multiple sessions with people
who have sought or been referred for professional help with psychological issues.
My use of this approach therefore leaves me open to criticisms of subjectivity,
and, given that I am not a qualified psychologist, of inadequate experience and
knowledge. However, it is not my reading of participants’ personalities that is of the
greater importance in this study, rather it is their personal accounts. Of much greater
relevance are their own beliefs of how dimensions of their personalities influenced their
responses to organisational change.
Methodological preferences aside, the interviews provide a rich vein of data on
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participant EI and personality in the context of change. I do not claim that they present a
full picture of individual differences, merely that in analysing them I have been
presented with a unique opportunity for the development of insight into emotional
experiences of organisational change. Had I had the luxury of more time I would have
explored both constructs in more depth. In terms of EI, I could have looked more
closely at the four branches of the Mayer and Salovey (1997) model and the four sets of
ability sitting on each branch. Likewise, I could explicitly have investigated many
personality traits, rather than letting the respondents choose them. Some respondents
made no meaningful comments at all on personality but with a more directed approach I
believe that personality issues could have been more fully researched.
7.8 Nature and Size of Interview Sample
The small size of the interview sample (24) and the local context would suggest a limit
to the generalisability of the responses, the quantitative term, or their confirmability, the
qualitative equivalent (Lincoln & Guba, 1985; Easterby-Smith et al., 2002). I do believe
that the interviews provide me with sufficient data to indicate that emotions were
experienced in each of the 13 research questions I investigated, although one, on change
outside of work, produced few comments. The 24 respondents not only shared with me
unique experiences but the analysis of transcripts also reveals both the different and
similar meanings they attached to concepts such as fairness, the meaning of resistance to
change, the influence of timing issues and so on. The location of the interviews
(Auckland) and the change experiences (New Zealand) may lend weight to issues of
nationality in the social construction of reality but a number were born outside the
country and the 24 were taken from various ethnic groups. The comments of
participants seemed to be similar to those reported in the literature and which cover
many different countries but cross-cultural studies do indicate that the experience,
expression and suppression of emotions may have cultural influences (e.g. Bagozzi et
al., 2003; Tan et al. 2003; Mann, 1999b; Bolton, 2005; Jones et al., 2003).
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CHAPTER 8: CONTRIBUTIONS, FURTHER RESEARCH DIRECTIONS,
PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS AND CONCLUSIONS
8.1 Overview of the Study
The main research aim was to investigate the emotional experience of people involved
in organisational change and their cognitive antecedents and behavioural consequences.
Of particular interest was the discovery of what emotions people felt, why they felt
them, how they managed them, and how these responses influenced their behaviour.
The literature review revealed a number of key points. Firstly, cognitive
appraisal theory indicates that emotions are triggered by events that individuals perceive
as promoting or threatening their wellbeing (Lazarus, 1991; 1993; Scherer, 1999).
Secondly, organisational change is potentially what Weiss and Cropanzano (1996)
describe as an affective event because it can deliver better or worse material outcomes,
and impact on people’s relationships (Tyler & Lind, 1992; Scandura, 1999) and sense of
identity (Ashforth & Mael, 1987). Thirdly, despite a pervasive mindset that emotions
are not rational (see Domaglaski, 1999), a thread that weaves its way through the work
of Weber (1947) and other writers, researchers across the fields of philosophy (e.g.
Solomon, 2003), sociology (e.g. Hochschild, 1983; Fineman, 2003), social psychology
(e.g. Leventhal & Scherer, 1987) and management and organisational
psychology/behaviour (e.g. Ashkanasy et al., 2000; 2002; 2005) have strongly argued
that emotions are mostly rational and therefore should not be marginalised as
inappropriate, disruptive and dysfunctional. Fourthly, coping theory (e.g. Folkman &
Lazarus, 1985; 1988; Lattack, 1986; Folkman & Moskowitz, 2000; 2004) has provided
insights into how people deal with emotions in difficult multiple settings, including
those that occur in organisational change (Woodward & Hendry, 2004; Rafferty &
Griffin, 2006). Fifthly, the emotional labour literature (Bolton, 2005; Mann, 1999b) has
put forward the message that while many emotions are considered inappropriate in
organisational settings, including those dealing with change (Bryant & Wolfram Cox,
2006; Smollan, 2006a), employees are at times expected to show certain emotions.
Finally, the literature on emotional intelligence has mostly described it as the ability to
understand one’s own emotions and those of others, and ‘manage’ both (Mayer &
Salovey, 1997). This is a strength when dealing with the emotions of organisational
change (Jordan, 2005; Smollan, 2006c).
Multiple other constructs emerged in the literatures on emotions and change.
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Many of them have been incorporated into affective models of change (Gibson, 1995;
Piderit, 2000; Brotheridge, 2003; Kiefer 2005). Some of these models deal with a
specific type of change, such as downsizing (Paterson & Härtel, 2002; Paterson & Cary,
2002), or focus on one major element, such as leadership (Szabla, 2007). The model I
developed for this study was an attempt to depict as many factors as appeared to
influence individual responses to change. These factors were categorised as those
relating to the change, those in the realm of the individual, those in the realm of the
change leader and managers and those relating to the organisation.
The methodological foundation of the study was social constructionism because
it provides insights into how subjective experience is shaped by multiple social
influences in organisational and other settings (e.g. Gergen, 1985). Social construction
theory has been a growing area of research into emotions (e.g. Fineman, 2003),
organisational change (e.g. Ford et al., 2000; Mills, 2000) and many of the other factors
contained in the model.
The interviews with 24 people from different organisations, departments and
positions revealed that change is an emotional event for all of the people concerned,
with varying levels of intensity. The deductive phase of analysis confirmed that all
factors were relevant to some of the participants, with concern for personal outcomes
and fairness as dominant themes. Inductive analysis uncovered the importance of two
extra factors, a person’s control over change and other relationships, inside and outside
the organisation. With the addition of these two factors, and the moving of the justice
variable from the group of factors relating to the change itself to those relating to the
employee perceptions of leaders, the model was revised.
8.2 Contributions to the Literature
This study has therefore extended the relatively thin qualitative literature on the
emotional aspects of change. It sheds light on what emotions were experienced, and
why, in more than 24 change settings (some participants referred to more than one
organisational change). It showed how people believed their ability to understand their
own emotions and those of others, and to deal with both, played an important role in
their roles as change leaders, managers and recipients. This thesis has consequently
extended this methodological approach to the study of emotions and organisational
change, and their interface with organisational justice, time, leadership, trust, culture
and other relevant constructs investigated.
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Two constructs researched in this study, emotional intelligence and personality,
have empirical qualitative literatures that are apparently so thin they are extremely hard
to find. Both have been extensively researched in quantitative fashion and the
challenges of exploring them with a qualitative approach have been discussed at length.
Feedback on the unorthodox qualitative treatment of these two constructs in this study
should not only enhance understanding of their substantive aspects but also of their
ontological, epistemological and methodological research foundations.
The model developed and revised for this study emanated from an attempt to
depict as many factors as appeared relevant that influence individual responses to
change. The revised model includes a wider range of factors than other models of
emotional responses to change have done. It therefore makes a substantial contribution
to the literature on emotions and change.
Exploration of the model through interviews revealed the complexity of
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change, and how ambivalent and
contradictory many of the responses were. Dawson (2003, p. 25) has called for a
“broader understanding of the complex, untidy and messy nature of change.” The
logical, recipe approach of many change writers, while providing ostensibly sound
advice, seldom captures the nature of change that Dawson refers to. Nor do these writers
adequately address the unique responses of individual players in change. Each of the
constructs embedded in the model evoke different affective responses, as the change
progresses from introduction to implementation and the aftermath. The fluid amalgam
of emotions of change form part of the wider experience of emotions in the workplace
and cannot easily be separated from them. This study has also answered Bamberger’s
(2008) call for more qualitative research into how internal and external contexts
influence our understanding of organisational dynamics.
8.3 Further Research Directions
The limitations to the research study were documented in the previous chapter where it
was pointed out, inter alia, that an interview of 60 to 90 minutes with 24 people in one
city cannot mine the territory of emotional responses to change in depth. Nevertheless,
the revised model provides a solid framework for further research into the emotions of
organisational change.
Further qualitative and quantitative studies could identify and explore a number
of other factors that might be relevant. Grounded theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967) and
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narrative approaches (Boje, 2001) may uncover aspects of change that have not yet been
adequately researched. The use of focus groups (e.g. N. Clarke, 2006; Dasborough,
2006) highlights the many similarities and differences in people’s responses to
organisational issues, and could be profitably used to research different reactions to the
same change within an organisation. Participant observation of change (e.g. Poder,
2004; Huy, 2002) would provide extra insights and a contextually richer stream of data
than single interviews could. Action research into change, as Lüscher and Lewis (2008)
showed, enables researchers and subjects to co-construct the purposes, methods and
data analysis of a multi-method research study.
The location of the study and nature of the respondents provided a particular
New Zealand-based context. Aspects of nationality seldom surfaced in the interviews
and future studies could investigate whether nationality (and ethnicity) played a role in
the emotional responses to organisational change. Previous studies have shown that
these factors influence how people show or hide emotion (e.g. Bagozzi et al., 2003),
deal with the affective ramifications of power issues (Mondillon et al., 2005), view the
emotions of injustice (Mikula et al., 1998) and cope with change (Oreg et al., 2008).
Cross-cultural issues dealing with the emotional elements of organisational relationships
in the context of change have been under-researched (Oreg et al., 2008). Issues of
gender were raised by two women in this study and this too is a factor that could be
explored in depth in future studies. Studies of gender have also explored emotions, or
change or related constructs (e.g. Bolton, 2005; Martin et al., 1998, Armstrong-Stassen,
1998; Morrison, 2008), but the intersection of gender, emotions and organisational
change has received inadequate attention.
While the respondents reported experience of more than 24 organisations, and
from various hierarchical levels, functional departments and industries, the issues
peculiar to different influences could be isolated and investigated. Views that lower
level staff are marginalised in change by the power of management (e.g. Bryant, 2003)
are juxtaposed with evidence from this study and others (e.g. Young, 200; Turnbull,
1999; Huy, 2002; Vince, 2006), that managers too, some at very senior levels,
experience negative outcomes in change and therefore negative emotions. While studies
have compared cognitive readiness for change at different hierarchical levels (e.g. Holt
et al., 2007) comparative studies of how different change players experience the
emotions of change are rare.
In addition to the various methods that could be used to further explore the
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emotional responses to change, some deeper ontological, epistemological and
methodological issues need more debate. I have indicated that there are multiple
perspective on emotions, such as the physiological, cognitive and social constructionist.
According to Küpers and Weibler (2008, p. 267), “Any single perspective on emotions
is likely to be partial, limited and perhaps distorted, what is needed is a multi-paradigm
and multi-level analysis, and thus integral research.”
The debate on how much of emotion is socially constructed has been engaged by
a variety of researchers (e.g. Gergen, 1985; Craib, 1995; Williams and Bendelow, 1996;
Burkitt, 1997; Schwandt, 2003; Clarke, 2003; Mann, 1999a; Bolton, 2005; Küpers &
Weibler, 2008). My own orientation has been to what Schwandt (2003) would term
‘weak’ social constructionism, in that I believe that while the experience and expression
of emotions has strong cultural influences, other forces play important roles.
While discussion about what Hibberd (2003) refers to as the metatheoretical
level of social constructionism will continue, the theoretical level of analysis of the
socially-constructed nature of emotion poses considerable challenge to the researcher.
And the context of organisational change as a site for emotions research is even more
daunting, given that added constructs, such as fairness, leadership, time and resistance
to change, both inform and confuse the issue of the origins of emotions. The
physiological approach to emotion can uncover what bodily reactions precede,
accompany or follow affective responses to change, the cognitive theorists will argue
that the emotions of change are always accompanied by thought, and social
constructionists of the strong and weak varieties will emphasise the complete or partial
influence of social interaction. Each approach has its strengths and weaknesses. An
integration of the various strands is a useful path to follow, but, as Sturdy (2003)
suggests, multi-method approaches that ignore crucial differences will be problematical.
Indeed, the more radical adherents of each school will likely view such efforts as not
merely a poor compromise but as conceptually flawed. As Denzin (1997), whose own
position is of strong social constructionism, consistently asks: Whose truth are we
referring to? Broader debates about social constructionism as a methatheory of
psychology and sociology and the narrower one on emotions, particularly in the context
of change, are bound to be passionate.
8.4 Practical Implications
The insights presented in this study should be of value to all types of change players:
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leaders, managers, agents and recipients. It was pointed out earlier that there are
conceptual and practical difficulties in distinguishing between various roles in
organisational change (Caldwell, 2003; Higgs & Rowland, 2000; Kanter et al., 1992)
and that one person can play several roles in the same change programme, or different
roles in different changes. Experience of organisational change can be a humbling
experience, even, or especially, for managers, who do not always control change events,
and who are subject to the same gamut of emotions as other organisational personnel.
The interviews conducted for this study revealed the complex emotional responses of
managers who played various roles in the change under consideration but who also
referred to different roles in different change events.
Change leaders should note what emotions and moods they are experiencing and
why, that they may experience both positive and negative changes at the same time, and
how they can transition between emotions as the changes play out over time. Doing this
effectively requires skill in all four levels of the emotional intelligence model of Mayer
and Salovey (1997). Change leaders tend to ride on the positive and negative emotions
and moods they may be experiencing (Isen, 2000) and could benefit from being more
balanced in their decision-making. Similarly, the challenges of leading change may
heighten feelings of anxiety that should be harnessed (Parrott, 2002) so that they do not
become counter-productive. Change leaders need to know how mood can enhance
creativity (Montgomery et al., 2004). Change leaders also need to understand that other
change players will respond in idiosyncratic ways to organisational change that depend
on the factors that may be particularly salient to the individuals concerned. Sanchez-
Burk and Huy (2008) advise change leaders to also be aware of the variety of emotions
of staff as individuals, in groups, and in the organisation as a whole. They point out that
while some people may view an announced change with fear or contempt, there might
be a sufficient number of other staff who have positive emotions such as hope, and
whose engagement can be leveraged to create a more positive momentum. Their
message is clear - focus on the individual and others.
Change managers or implementers have to deal with their own emotions and
moods and those of change leaders, agents and recipients. They may not agree with the
changes yet are expected to show the appropriate behaviours, and often the emotions too
(Turnbull, 2002; Huy, 2002). Issues of power accompany many change programmes
(Buchanan & Badham, 2008) and deliver their own emotional dynamics. External
change agents also have to manage the emotions of various stakeholders, but are as
281
prone to emotional responses as any others, even though their stake in the change may
be different (Jarrett, 2004). Greater insight into the emotional responses to change - and
their causes and consequences - would serve both change managers and agents well.
Change recipients, and this includes all involved in change in some way, find
many aspects of change to be emotional. They too need to understand their own
emotional responses, and how to deal with them, while simultaneously noting the
reactions of other internal stakeholders at various hierarchical levels, as well as those of
outsiders who may be affected by the organisation’s change.
While this thesis, and most of the literature on emotions and change, focuses on
organisational staff, the emotions of external directors (Dulewicz & Higgs, 2003),
shareholders (Ward, 2006) and other outsiders also need to be taken into account. The
cognitive and affective responses of suppliers, customers, joint venture partners and
government to an organisation’s change can affect its success.
A key to understanding affective responses to change is emotional intelligence.
Many researchers have called for training in EI at all levels in the organisation so that
people can predict, identify and manage workplace emotions, including those arising
from change (Goleman, 1998b; Druskat & Wolff, 2001; Jordan et al., 2002a; Jordan and
Troth, 2002; Sosik & Megerian, 1999). If EI is aggregated in an organisation it creates
what Huy (1999) labels emotional capability - a systemic acknowledgement and
validation of the emotional nature of change and the capacity to deal with it. Training
courses in EI are offered on many consultancy websites and, despite their pleas for
training in EI, researchers have been concerned that weakly researched models and
poorly developed programmes may both be ineffective and give EI a bad name,
especially given the controversies that bedevil (and enrich) the EI discourse. Research
in training effectiveness in EI is urgently needed and is beginning to develop (e.g.
Groves, McEnrue & Shen, 2008). Confirmation that training in EI enhances the
experience of organisational change (Antonacopoulou & Gabriel, 2001; Jordan, 2005)
has yet to be established.
8.5 Conclusions
Laments in the 1990s that emotion has been under-researched have given way to the
heralding of the ‘affective revolution’ (Barsade, Brief & Spataro, 2003) and “a near
explosion of research on the topic” (Elfenbein, 2007, p. 316). The breadth of research
282
into the emotions of organisational change has been less impressive but this relationship
has increasingly been highlighted.
Emotions are central to life in all its facets. Work presents a site where the
emotional issues of power, identity and group relations are ignited, sometimes in
explosive ways. This thesis has emphasised both the alignment and misalignment of
thought, emotion and action when individuals experience organisational change. It has
highlighted the multi-faceted, complex, conflicting and ambivalent responses to
different aspects of the change. It has directed the reader to the individual ways in which
people at all levels and in all change roles play the game of change, sometimes by rules
that are socially constructed, sometimes by their own rules, which they have
consciously or subconsciously determined. People need the skill to be able to identify,
label and manage emotions to benefit themselves, others and the organisation itself.
Training people in emotional intelligence and organisational change will deliver
emotional capability on an organisational level (Huy, 1999) and more productive
experiences in organisational change. The current worldwide economic crisis has
already spawned multiple organisational changes, and will continue to do so. An
understanding of the emotions of change is an imperative, to minimise the negative
consequences for organisations and their staff.
Finally, writing this thesis has been my own journey of change. The depth and
breadth of knowledge I have gained from reviewing the literature, interviewing 24
participants, leading, managing and experiencing organisational change in my own
university, writing and presenting conference papers, and listening to discourses of
change in other contexts, has made this doctoral study an emotional rollercoaster of
personal change.
283
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CHAPTER 10: APPENDICES
Appendix 1: Participant Information
Code Gender Age at interview
Ethnicity Industry
Dept
Role in hierarchy*
Type of change#
A M 40 E Prof services Tech S Restructuring Job design
B F 40 E Service HR E Restructuring Job design
C M 50 E Manufacturing Eng S Acquisition Job design
D F 50 E Prof services HR E Redundancy E M 40 E Fin services HR S Restructuring F M 40 E Manufacturing Ops M Restructuring
Job design G M 50 E Retail HR S Redundancy H F 40 E Health GM G Job design J M 30 A Services Cust serv F Policy K M 50 E Prof services Cust serv E Redundancy L F 40 E Prof services HR E, F, M Multiple M M 40 E Health Ops S Restructuring
Job design N M 40 E Communication GM G Outsourcing
Redundancy O F 30 M Social services Ops E Redundancy P F 30 P Health Ops S Acquisition
Job design Q F 40 E Services HR S Job design R F 50 E Services HR S Multiple S F 40 E Prof services Ops S Restructuring
Job design T F 30 M Social services Tech E, F Job design
Office move U F 30 A Retail Sales E Acquisition V M 40 P Social services Ops E Restructuring
Suspension Dismissal
W M 40 E Communication HR S Acquisition Job design Redundancy
X F 50 A Social services Security E Operations Y M 30 P Communication GM G Office move Role in hierarchy (at time of interview)* E = Employee F = First-level manager M= Middle manager S = Senior manager G = General manager Type of change# The main types of change are listed but other changes may also have occurred.
342
Appendix 2: Interview Questions
Describing the change and the individual’s response to it
The individual’s perception of the nature of the change and overall emotional reactions.
1. Please describe the change that took place in your organisation.
2. Please describe your emotional reactions to the change.
Describing factors that may mediate the individual’s cognitive and affective responses
to the change
The individual’s perception of the impact of the change on him/her and on others
3. What impact did the change have on your job or some aspect of your
employment?
4. What impact did the change have on others?
5. How favourable were the outcomes and for whom?
6. And did these outcomes have an emotional impact on you?
The individual’s perception of the scale, frequency, speed and timing of change
7. How big a change was this for you?
8. And did the scale of the change have an emotional impact on you?
9. Had there been many other changes as a result of this change, or had there been
many other types of change before and after this change?
10. And did the frequency of the change have an emotional impact on you?
11. How fast was the change?
12. And did the pace of change have an emotional impact on you?
13. How relevant was the timing of the change?
14. And did the timing of the change have an emotional impact on you?
The individual’s perception of the fairness of the change
15. How fair were the outcomes of change?
16. And did this have an emotional impact on you?
17. How fair were the processes of change?
18. And did this have an emotional impact on you?
343
19. How fair was the information you were given about the change?
20. And did this have an emotional impact on you?
21. How fair was the interaction between you and your manager, or other change
managers?
22. And did this have an emotional impact on you?
The individual’s evaluation of the change
23. Based on what you have said so far…what were your views on how positive or
negative these changes were?
The individual’s perception of his/her emotion management
24. Were you expected to show any emotion in the implementation of change?
25. Were you expected to hide any emotion in the implementation of change?
26. How did you manage your emotions?
27. Were you expected to generate emotions in others?
28. Were you expected to manage the emotions of others?
29. Did your emotions change over time?
The individual’s perception of his/her behavioural response
30. What actions were expected of you as a result of the change process?
31. What actions did you actually take as a result of the change process?
32. Why did you take these actions?
33. Did you resist the change and if yes, how?
The individual’s perception of factors that may moderate his/her cognitive, affective
and behavioural responses to change
The individual’s perception of individual factors and how they affected his/her
cognitive, affective and behavioural responses to change
34. In terms of your personality how do you usually react to change?
35. Did any previous experience of organisational change affect how you responded
to this change?
36. Were there any other personal factors, outside the organisation, that affected
how you responded to this change?
344
The individual’s perception of leadership/management factors and how they affected
his/her cognitive, affective and behavioural response to change
37. How well was the change managed by your manager, and more senior
managers?
38. How did their leadership ability affect how you thought, felt and behaved in
terms of the change?
39. Did the way they managed the change affect your perceptions of how
trustworthy they were?
40. Did they know what you thought and what you felt and how did they
respond?
The individual’s perception of organisational factors and how they affected his/her
cognitive, affective and behavioural response to change
41. How did the culture of the organisation impact on your responses to the change?
42. Were there any other organisational issues that affected your responses to the
change?
345
Appendix 3: Tables of data analysis
Questions 1-8 Types of change (Porras and Robertson) + scale + outcomes
Ptc.
Code +
role
1
Type of change
1
Type of change
Major category
1
Type of change
Minor category
7, 8
Scale of change
3, 5, 6
Outcomes for self
+ ve (+ control)
3, 5, 6
Outcomes for self
– ve + control
4, 5, 6
Outcomes for others +
ve
4, 5, 6
Outcomes for others
- ve A Senior manager
Restructuring Organising Technology
Structure Management style Job design
‘It was major’ But then did….>
Less influence/ Responsibility Lower job satisfaction ‘Sense of loss’ ‘sadness’, grief low control and expected more . ‘Senior mgt has power over my future’ Psych C- he hadn’t delivered on promises ‘It’s just not nice being on the losing side of the equation’
Some mgrs like less responsibility. ‘relief’
B Junior HR
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy
Organising Technology
Structure Management style Job design
‘It was extra huge’
Career opportunity Hugely energizing Redund payout
‘I burnt out’ (from the work and conflict) Good for CEO+GMs low control and expected more ‘It pushed me to the point where I broke and it changed my life.’ ‘Pressure cooker finally bursting’ - Had to work 80-90 hours pw – then offered $500 - insulting
Redundancy package Some got good jobs elsewhere GM/CEO looked good – headcount reduction
Redundancy ‘People were suspicious, they
felt betrayed’ ‘Middle managers were
gutted’ staff were ‘absolutely devastated
C Senior manager
Take over: division sold Location move Redundancy for some others
Organising Social Physical setting Technology
Goals Strategies Structure Admin policies and procedure Admin sys Remuneration Ownership Culture Management style Interaction processes Informal patterns and networks Space config Physical ambience Interior design Arch design All incl job design
Not big for me Big for others
New co. committed to expansion of mnf Some control ‘relaxed’ about the new employers ‘Positive people’ Less stressful than previous employer
‘disappointed’ to leave company after 33 years. Redund was stressful Some control Lower remuneration Lousy office Job had less challenge Lower job satisfaction
Some made redundant ‘surprise, shock, dismay, real
concern’
D HR con- sultant
Redundancy all all Big Started own business ‘in hindsight it was a favour’ It was a real cathartic exercise. It made me move on mentally’
No control Move back to remun or redundant ‘distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out’, angry
Got a shock because there had been no redundancies before
E Senior HR
Restructure Org Social
Structure + all others for others Interaction Informal patterns Self +others
Big for some others, not for me ‘Satisfaction’ Helped to build relationships, exert influence High control
Extra work ‘Stress’ But little other emotional impact
Good for co. More jobs Some got better positions Grief Shock denial
Some redundancies One big loser at senior level anxiety Cycle acceptance
346
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
Restructure = transfer Org Technology ‘revolutionary change and evolutionary, organic change’, p 6
Structure Job design Technical expertise
Eng – possible big job change then moved to HR = big …….>
Got into new career (HR) silver lining Anticipation of new role
Little control /expected more Anger at being out of control. High degree of uncertainty and not being able to have any influence on the outcome. Being done unto and left to clean up the mess’ black cloud, ‘royal pain in the neck distressing’ fear of new job, trepidation, concern’ Transition phase was ‘bloody horrible’ ‘standard transition stuff…its not the change that does you in it’s the transition’ ‘Revolutionary change’ = tense
Relief (ownership issue) Some got good roles.
Some redundancy
G Senior HR
Branch closed = redundancy for others
Org arrangements Goals Strategies Structure Others?
‘Huge’ big for those made redundant
Pride, because no PGs High control
Extra work, extra travel, ‘Stress’ nervousness meeting deadlines
Got other jobs Excellent redundancy package
Redundancy ‘pissed off’ ‘stressed’ ‘personal grieving process Some sabotage
H GM then senior mgr
Ownership change. Job change finally left
Org arrangements Social factors
Goals Strategies Structure Admin systems Ownership Culture Management style Interaction processes Informal patterns
Big Significant Ownership change led to various other changes’ and they became closer to impacting me as an individual’ ………………..>
…………………….>
Low control expected much more Reported to own subordinate Lost authority, status ‘shock’‘indignant’ (sys change) ‘I was now reporting to someone who didn't really know, know much about what was going on so I was still doing the work’ ‘Excluded from board meetings and the governance of the organisation.’ Excluded from social functions Shifting of loyalties of staff
Subordinate got GM job Company got ‘their man’ in
Some people left HR manager resigned
J st level mgr
Cut costs Org arrangements Social factors
Admin polices Management style
Said it was big (but does not seem like it)
Low control expected more More work More hours More pressure Anger resentment
Good for client A few redundancies anxiety
K HR con-sultant
From employee to consultant = redundancy
Org arrangements Social factors Phys setting
Goals Strategies Structure Interaction proc Informal patterns Indiv attributes Likely move off premises
Big Set up own consultancy and still works for EMA Earns good income
Low control: “I wasn’t in charge of my own destiny.” ‘sadness’ Drank more Now works more hours
People who stayed got better deal
Anxiety for others affected in same way
L HR mgr
10 years of change Job design Culture
Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Structure Interaction proc Informal patterns Indiv attributes Job redesign
‘quite significant’ Varying degrees of Happy ending, euphoric, elated
control ‘Dark periods of time’ ‘Hard going’ ‘Doubting, questioning’ ‘Undermined’ confusion, anger’ sleepless nights
Support form partic Mgrs had to be more consultative Anxiety for other person ‘Undermined’ sad Note establishment of HR role meant ‘taking power’ from senior managers’
347
M Senior mgr
Restructure + redundancy self Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Goals Strategies Structure Ownership Culture Management style Interaction proc Informal patterns Indiv attributes Job redesign Technical expertise
‘It was a significant change on paper’
Could have got what seemed bigger role Big redundancy payout Varying degrees of Redundancy = opportunity = relief, excitement
... but wasn’t self-doubt control expected more Lower job satisfaction ‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ Got nowhere Difficult when people’s families phone (redund)
MD made redundant Others anxiety – roller coaster
N GM
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy others
Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Goals Strategies Structure Interaction process Informal patterns Job redesign Workflow
Big – franchising, restructuring outsourcing + redundancies, redeployment, job redesign
Came in as new GM and had to drive the process ‘the impact to me personally was nil’ High control Little emotion
Had to manage difficult processes Had to deal with insults
Some transferred to new co and got paid slightly extra Supervisors had fewer reports and less responsibility/hassle + = relief?
Some were made redundant or redeployed Fewer reports could be seen negatively as a loss But GM did not hear this. Disbelief, denial, nervousness, anger, acceptance
O Employee
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Structure Culture Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes Job redesign
‘Life changing’ for self = made redundant
Got another job elsewhere before leaving + pay Relief when process was clarified= certainty
Made redundant Stressful Lack of control: I don’t like being a passenger Anger, frustration
Senior people gained None made redundant Some junior people got redeployed
Those made redundant One was traumatized, crying, frightened
P Senior mgr
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Structure Culture Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes Job redesign
‘Huge’ ‘upheaval’
Hopeful …initially that something good would come out of it Got good job elsewhere
Disestablished division, disagreed with outcomes of change, relocated to different city, relationships broke up, ‘our function was being devalued’ Low control, expected more ‘horrible feeling of lack of control’ control’ ‘we felt quite useless’ Anxiety, concern, disappointment, sadness, stress, upset, emotionally draining, tiring, hopeless, then indifferent
People did not like major restructuring, culture change Loss, uncertainty, demoralising
Q Senior HR contractor
Restructuring Job redesign, redundancies + cultural change
Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Structure Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes Job redesign
Self - big, new contract, others was very big for some not for others
Fun, challenge, new interesting, extension of contract Good outcomes for co. High control
Personal attacks, ‘screaming and yelling’ Sad, disappointed
Excitement - for those who could see benefit, e.g. promotion opportunities, challenge of new role
Fright, nervousness, stress – for those who foresaw problems with role or redundancy hurt, humiliation, anger, distress, those who lost their supervisory roles and took lower level work or redundancy
R Senior HR
Restructuring De-merger Remuneration Performance management Cultural change
Org arrangements Social factors
Goals Strategies Structure Admin policies Admin systems Reward systems Ownership Culture Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes
‘massive’ It built credibility High degree of satisfaction in seeing people change High control
Increased workload Pressure, tired
The majority gained Happy if remuneration went up People were getting feedback Interest, excitement, pleasure, appreciation
Unhappy if remuneration went down Shock, horror, fear, apathy
348
S Senior mgr
Restructuring
Org arrangements Social factors
Strategies Structure Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes
Significant massive
Opportunity Significance of role has been confirmed (status) High control
Process of managing change was tough, draining
Increased resp., higher level Relief for those who wanted reduced role
Unhappiness for those who got reduced roles
T Employee then manager
Relocation to new town Org arrangements Social factors Phys setting Technology
Strategies Structure Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes Space config Physical ambience Interior design Arch design Job design Technical expertise
Huge, massive
Opportunity excitement Promoted More money more later when became manager
Shock, fear (reloc) Little control earlier…
Those who moved got more money, those who stayed behind got good jobs elsewhere
Some were made redundant – no payout ‘bad feeling’, traumatic
U Shop assistant
Merger Org arrangements Social factors
Ownership Mgt style
Minor impact on self
Relaxed when no redundancies were announced Low control and no expectation of any
Understaffed when some left due to take over Another co: locks on door changed by liquidators – felt cheated because promised more time surprised, anxious
Some did not want to work under new manager and left Uncertainty, nervousness
V Sports facilitator
Restructure Suspension Dismissal
Org arrangements Social factors
Structure Culture Management style Indiv attributes
Huge suspended/ dismissed
Won his case, got compensation
Lost money, drank more, took a job he did not want Low control Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very anger, then relieved (outcome/process)
Various stakeholders were perceived to have lost from his dismissal
W Senior HR
Restructure Redundancy others
Org arrangements Social factors Technology
Structure Ownership Culture Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes Job design Workflow
Organisation – big Self - not big
Opportunity to showcase change mgt skills High control
More work, travel Frustration people had not embraced change
Better career options + opportunities enthusiasm
Redundancy Some lost mgt positions Anger, frustration
X Security guard
Building expansion Work schedules
Org arrangements Social factors Phys setting
Goals Strategies Admin systems Culture Management style Interaction process Informal patterns Indiv attributes Space config Physical ambience Interior design Arch design
Got training, permanent position = happy salary increase for some years not others …>
No general salary inc – due change, pay for expansion No control Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction, no login, more work during construction = frustrated, = unhappy Missed out on promotion = cried
Good for organisation
Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy
Y Small bus owner
Office move Org arrangements Phys setting
Goals Strategies Space config Physical ambience Interior design Arch design
High control As owner: business grew Excitement, pride comfortable that I could deal with extra work but…
Extra work, more travel Some anxiety, stress
Good for organisation Less travel for most staff Busy, variety, enjoying their work
More travel for some staff
349
Observations Positions of people listed on info sheet not the same as position of change recalled. Number of HR people may have been because they were recommended by consultants in the same area.
1. Q 1-8 (some also Q23 – overall evaluation) and from other parts of transcripts 2. Common types:
Restructure/job redesign 22 Redundancy self 6 Redundancy others 10
(People may have been selected by consultants because they know someone who had been in a major change, and/or participants selected a major change) 3. Porras and Robertson categories: Organising arrangements 24 Social factors 17 Physical setting 6 Technology 13 (sub-categories not always easy to establish) 4. Most have positive and negative outcomes for self and others 5. Positive outcomes for self generally associated with high control, negative with lower/no control Low/no control 5 Low /no control but expected more 7 High control 8 Both high/low 4 6. Scale - most people said it was major, massive, huge for self and for others too.
Note ambiguities: Huge for whom? Referring to final outcomes or processes to achieve outcomes or both? 7. Positive outcomes = positive emotions, negative outcomes = negative emotions 8. Intensity seems higher for negative outcomes. 9. Intensity seems higher for own outcomes. 10. Intensity seems higher for low control. 11. Negative outcomes impact on family – rather than family issue impact on ability to deal with change (Q36) 12. There can be multiple outcomes of change, some small - some big, some short-term – some longer term, some favourable – some unfavourable’. Emotional reactions to change therefore vary.
350
Questions 9-14 Temporal dimensions
Affective Response to Temporality Perceived Influence (distinguish between influence on change in general vs. influence on temporal nature of
Perceived Outcomes (distinguish between influence on change in general G vs.
influence on temporal nature of change T) 11, 12
Speed of Change 9, 10
Frequency of Initiatives in Change 13, 14
Timing of Initiatives and/or Change
for Self for Others
Ptc. code
Positive/Neg-ative Affect
High/Low Intensity
Positive/Negative Affect
High/Low Intensity
Positive/Negative Affect
High/Low Intensity
Spoke from position of
having influenced
change
Spoke from position of
having expected to influence
change (more)
Spoke from position of
receiving change
Positive Negative Positive Negative
A Senior manager
- Blink of eye… it was gone like that. Felt disen-franchised. Grief cycle
Fait accompli Cast in stone Level of consultation was token
Lost influence G+T
B Junior HR
-ve absolutely furious (see also timing = schedule change) Other aspects ‘I like thing moving fast, I like fast, I like volume’
H H
…………> deflation
C Senior manager
Sale went through quickly
Things were in a constant state of change quantum changes in owners and sense of direction
-ve concern -couldn’t have come at a worse time for business
L /// (some) G Happy over redundancy pay
G Surprise, shock, dismay
D HR con- sultant
-ve shock, anger, anxiety They wanted me gone bang Very fast and unexpected
H No consultation I didn’t feel in control
G started my own bus.
T Others might see this as (instant) dismissal = poor reputation
E Senior HR
-ve Frustration when others take longer to get the picture
L? /// T Frustration wastes time G Stress – more work Concern for others
T Too fast = anxiety, being swept along engineered T Too slow = frustration G angst around clarity
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
More about others and about G issues
/// /// G got better role later
G Pain in neck, angry
T (freq) Organisation was change weary punch-drunk uncertainty
G Senior HR
Emo related to issues not time
G G More travel, more hours, more stress T – nervousness re deadlines G Concern for thers
T Timing = stress for managers of change G trauma, anxiety, anger
351
H GM then senior mgr
Emo related to issues not time
G G shock
J 1st level mgr
-ve Anger and resentment
? T Timing, extra hours + wife had baby, mother sick
G T Timing, extra hours + wife had baby, mother sick
K HR con-sultant
‘About right.’
L HR mgr
-ve doubt, apprehensive, on edge
-ve I was wary of change
L Importance of sequence, p11
G
M Senior mgr
Too slow: Guilt ‘I had to stop short of outright lying’ Worried about confidentiality when I told colleagues
It was a rollercoaster
H G Mostly in control
G Things were being done to me
Felt guilty – lacked integrity
N GM
G+T Concern for others
G highs G lows, poor morale, uncertainty, falling apart, browbeaten T too fast =could be out of job soon T slow = need finality
O Employee
-ve powerless, stressed. Slow in beginning, then freefall
L? G+T
P Senior mgr
Too slow -ve frustration -ve, concern for others
H ?
Comfort – you get used to it ‘this sector is used to change …we take it as part of the game’
L G+T Concern T slow Uncertainty can demoralise people
Q Senior HR contractor
Too slow for Q, mgt and staff -ve frustration ‘Union kept challenging us’
H G change T pace Delay causes pain
352
R Senior HR
Too slow -ve frustration
- ve We had so many balls in the air -ve shock, horror +ve Inspiring, exciting
H cycle of emotions
G change T pace T freq Change weariness
S Senior mgr
Too fast -ve draining
H + ve excited
H
G+T G opportunity T pace + G= extra work
G or T ?instability Timing = lower bonus
T Employee then manager
H Stress
G=T
U Shop assistant
Too fast –liquidator locked the doors
V Sports facilitator
-ve anger, anxiety
H G+T G+T Suspended next day G + T (speed)
W Senior HR
-ve, Frust ration when when others take too long to get the picture
H? -ve pressure of 3 changes
? G T pace Dealing with others negativity, lack of trust
G negativity, lack of trust, T frustration with slow pace
X Security guard
Too fast -ve unhappy Too slow - ve delay in change in parking = happy
L -ve unsettled L -ve Irritation 2 issues Schedule change = surprise
L L
G+T T happy over schedule delay unwanted change
T unhappy over sudden schedule change (hours of work)
Y Small bus owner
-ve stress L Excitement -growth
T freq More work
14 11 4 1 0 12 3 5 17 2 10 Too fast 8 + ve 3 Too slow 6 - ve 9 (1= both) - ve 4 Observations
1. Information mostly taken from Q9-14 but also from other parts of transcript. 2. Some participants use cognitively-oriented words not emotions. 3. Some use emotion-laden words. 4. Some could not label emotions. 5. Emotions partly due to time, partly to other aspects of change, or other aspects of organisation. 6. Emotions may be related to personality. 7. Many experienced more than one temporal issue. 8. Some confused one temporal aspect with another. 9. Temporal concepts do overlap – timing can be related to speed, frequency or actual time of implementation 10. More negative than positive responses but some had no comment 11. Speed, timing – some said no such thing as right speed or right time – depends on issue and people affected, pros and cons 12. Change leaders often frustrated by slow speed. 13. Intensity higher when focusing outcomes for self v others. 14. Intensity tends to be higher for negative outcomes. 15. Intensity higher when participants lack control, of change in general and time in particular.
353
Questions 15-22 Justice
Ptc.
Code
+ role
Type of
change
Outcomes
for self
+ ve
& control
Outcomes for
self – ve
& control
Outcomes for
others + ve
Outcomes for
others
- ve
Distributive Justice
15, 16
Procedural Justice
17, 18
Informational Justice
19, 20
Interpersonal Justice
21, 22
A Senior manager
Restructuring
Less influence/ Responsibility ‘Sense of loss’ ‘sadness’ low control and expected more Psych C- he hadn’t delivered on promises
Some mgrs like less respons. ‘relief’
+/- ‘things that seem fair and equitable when you’re benefiting from them don’t seem quite so fair afterwards when you’re not” but then did ….>
- ‘star system’ ‘my biggest distress is a actually the process because of lack of involvement and a decision that had a major impact on my role being presented as a fait accompli’ Psych C- he hadn’t delivered on promises
+/- what yes, when yes, ‘ the why didn’t ring true’
+ ‘my manager told me he really wanted it to work for me’ - But felt trepidation, loss, don’t care, don’t belong
B Junior HR
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy
Career opportunity Hugely energising Redund payout
‘I burnt out’ (from the work and conflict) Good for CEO+GMs low control and expected more ‘It pushed me to the point where I broke and it changed my life.’ - I had to work 80-90 hours per week. I didn’t have a day off for months at a time. ‘Pressure cooker finally bursting’
Redundancy package Some got good jobs elsewhere
Redundancy ‘People were suspicious, they felt betrayed’ ‘Middle managers were gutted’ staff were ‘absolutely devasted
+ Redund package was fair. - ‘I needed help. I was drowning and nobody recognised it’ - I had to work overnight… -other workload issues 80-90 hours p.w. Got offered $500 extra - insulting
- unsatisfactory managers could turn down applic for voluntary redund. - furious redundancies announced ahead of agreed schedule (no employee input) - stressed poor people were kept and good ones went I felt compromised…I felt a bit dirty…I had been sullied… I felt I was being used.’
INJ answer here = IPJ> - ‘some of the communication [from the union] was not clear, transparent’ - ‘They were absolutely devastated’ [not given accurate info by union]
‘What pissed me off was just the lies’ (from mgt) And I felt bad that I was having to go and spout this stuff but I knew it wasn’t really the whole story. I had to cloak it in really nice terms’ guilt ‘they cloaked it as a reorganisation’ ‘We promised the employees we would be honest and open…we’ll tell you first.’ Psych C ‘some cynical decisions made with the intent to pull the wool over the employees eyes and it annoyed me because they thought that the employees were so stupid that they couldn’t see it and that just really pissed me off.’
+ It was planned to be very sensitive. Line managers cared about their people deeply. + Counsellors waiting to help them’ - Senior mgt were cut off and insensitive to the junior workforce. They never got amongst the people. They never listened to them. - the lack of caring of junior staff - swearing (workers to partic)
C Senior manager
Take over: division sold Location move Redundancy for some others
New co. committed to expansion of mnf Severance package Some control ‘relaxed’ about the new employers ‘Positive people’ Pleased, less stressful than the company
‘disappointed’ to leave company after 33 years. Redund was stressful Some control Lower remuneration Lousy office Job had less challenge
Some made redundant ‘shock, dismay, real concern’
Severance package = + but amount – (contradiction?) Lower remuneration Bit disappointed Lousy office = disappointed? Job had less challenge
‘neutral’
neutral emo’ info rec + ‘All my q’s were answered openly.’ uncomfortable info given “you know that you’re not telling the whole truth”
“You’ve got to tell them lies.’
Fair Boss sensitive
354
D HR consultant
Redundancy Started own business ‘in hindsight it was a favour’ It was a real cathartic exercise. It made me move on mentally’
No control Move back to remun or redundant ‘distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out, angry
Got a shock because there had been no redundancies before
- Lost my job distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out, angry + got redundancy package restraint of trade violation of Psyc C
- not consulted angry - expected to leave immed note: emotional reactions due to all types of justice
----------- ‘He didn’t once look me in the eye’ but ‘that was so unlike him’ ‘I wanted to sit there and howl my eyes out. It was real strange, so emotional and so angry and stubborn’ ‘the one secret pleasure I got out of seeing him uncomfortable over it. I was quite glad he was uncomfortable’
E Senior HR
Restructure ‘Satisfaction’ helped build relationships, exert influence- High control
Extra work ‘Stress’ But little other emotional impact
Good for co. More jobs Some got better positions Grief acceptance
Some redundancies One big loser at senior level cycle Shock denial
‘When people feel they have lost something the element of fairness comes into it’
Processes were fair from participants view, lots of consultation, transparent ‘open forums’
Angst around clarity Very open, very fair Information would be more of a settling thing = no other agendas. ‘Change causes anxiety if people believe they’ve got some facts, but there’s more that they don’t know, and they should.’ But… Leaks can cause anxiety and disquiet. Full and frank but discomfort about communication with one person – not full disclosure Low control? Information was ‘consistent’ and ‘scripted’ Open forums
-------------------
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
Restructure = transfer
Got into new career (HR) silver lining anticipation looking forward
Little control ‘being done unto and left to clean up the mess’ black cloud ‘royal pain in the neck distressing’ trepidation, concern’ Transition phase was ‘bloody horrible’
Relief (ownership issue) Some got good roles.
Some redundancy wrong people sometimes made redundant DJ+PJ…..>
Fair from a rational perspective, unfair from an emotional perspective For self - fair For others – partly, wrong people sometimes made redundant ‘ it was the way it the out come was delivered and basically dropped into everybody’s lap’
Token consultation Anger at being out of control – high degree of uncertainty
People questioned the data being used, extrapolations were not necessarily valid = concern?
Boss was supportive
G Senior HR
Branch closed = redundancy for others
Pride, because no PGs High control
Extra work, extra travel, ‘Stress’ anxiety
Got other jobs Excellent redundancy package
Redundancy ‘pissed off, angry ‘stressed’‘personal grieving process Extra work for HO staff
Yes, support, but two people thought it was unfair ‘I don’t think anybody thinks losing their job is fair’
Seemed best practice redundancy programme No PGs Got quotes - thanks
Seemed best practice redundancy programme
We treated them with respect. Our values are to be respectful and supportive Fair but at times heated
H GM then senior mgr
Ownership change. Job change finally left
Low control expected much more Reported to own subordinate Lost authority, status ‘shock’ ‘indignant’ (sys change) Excluded from social functions
Subordinate got GM job Owners got their man in charge
Lost status, most senior position, lost control Excluded from board meetings and the governance of the organisation
Boss brought in as subordinate then made her boss. ‘It was a job for the boys’ Closed application process Some consultation process about restructure – minimal Unjustly held accountable for withholding info. Fear unhappy
Dishonest to appoint marketing manager then appoint him as CEO ‘which was probably always the intended plan.’ No information about the change
First boss very supportive. Later…I lost that support ‘This was getting ugly’
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J 1st level mgr
Cut costs Low control expected more More work More hours More pressure Anger resentment
Good for client A few redundancies anxiety
Unfair that we had to main quality of service with reduced budget Extra work Bowing down Not happy
No consultation Another company: Given some information at beginning but no updates anxiety
Told: “I don’t want to know about how difficult or why it can’t be done’
K HR consultant
From employee to consultant = redundancy
Set up own consultancy and still works for EMA Independent, god money, took 2 yrs
Redundant Now more hours Low control ‘sadness’
People who stayed got better deal
Anxiety for others affected in same way
neutral Ambivalent Another company Very fair , consultation High control
fair fine
L HR mgr
10 years of change Job design Culture
Varying degrees of Gained credibility, experience, more senior role after a longer period Happy ending, euphoric
control ‘Dark periods of time’ lost confidence ‘Hard going’ ‘self- doubting questioning’ ‘Undermined’ confusion, anger’ outcomes + process
Mgrs had to be more consultative
Anxiety for other person
- Shared role = ‘Undermined ’ in beginning but outcome later was good -Unfair for other person + euphoric, elated when finally got sole role - sad for other person
- both given parallel roles with uncertainty as to who would get senior role sleepless nights - Unfair for self and other person - wary I cried, was very angry
Believed new person would report to her. Not enough info as to why = nervous, no trust, apprehensive, on edge ‘you’d never really have a straight conversation with him’ (boss)
-‘ may the best man win’ + But ‘you are always treated with respect’ = confusion Systemic justice? – ‘I think that the people in the organisation are very fair people’ but…
M Senior mgr
Restructure + redundancy self
Could have got what seemed bigger role Big redundancy payout Varying degrees of Planned own exit Redundancy = opportunity = relief, excitement
... but wasn’t ‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ redundancy control expected more self-doubt
Some got new roles, bigger roles Some lost roles they could not cope with
MD +others made redundant Others anxiety – roller coaster
Fair for self Redundancies of others fair
-Frustration – deals done behind closed doors ‘there wasn’t the openness’…debated by exec but not rest of the business…’it was very much the top deciding’ - Senior mgrs were deciding redundancies without proper process -Shame at how others were treated Low control -frustration and anger and loss of trust in MD when M’s role was changed without consultation
Guilt – I had to stop short of outright lying other (CEO) : ‘underhanded feel to the process, that was planned well in advance and hidden’ Low control His view: ‘it’s about telling people the facts and what’s in it for them.’
Both + (group) and – (1-1) he yelled and ranted and raved (due to stress) I was devastated, + anger, frustration
N GM
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy others
Came in as new GM and had to drive the process ‘the impact to me personally was nil’ High control Little emotion
Had to manage difficult processes Had to deal with insults
Some transferred to new co and got paid extra Supervisors had fewer reports and less responsibility/hassle + = relief?
- Some were made redundant or redeployed Disbelief, denial, nervousness, anger, acceptance - managers were nervous, anxious when facing affected emp
+ Those tfd = slightly more pay + Mgrs could focus on other aspects of business GM thought outcomes were fair (pride) but said some people thought it unfair – lost their jobs
+ a lot of consultation, Felt good about process Thought others would also see it as fair Pride in exiting process EAP, counseling etc ‘are we treating people the way we wanted to be treated ourselves?’
Fair ‘in fairness it’s more about actually sharing with people the vision around why we are doing it’ ‘Open and honest and upfront’ – dispels distrust and scepticism
Fair Wants a person to walk out of the organisation saying I was treated with dignity and respect Pride that we did it the right way
O Employee
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Got another job elsewhere before leaving Relief when process was clarified= certainty
Made redundant and got redund pay Stressful Lack of control: I don’t like being a passenger Anger, frustration
Senior people gained Some junior people got redeployed Relief when not made redundant
Those made redundant One was traumatized, crying, frightened
Fair for self = grateful Not transparent, ‘ there was a lot camouflaging (Info j?) and they actually broke the protocol’ One colleague not supported Psych Contract p 11
‘there was a lot of camouflaging False hope Not given the full picture - didn’t really give the full intent of the review
Very supportive= good, valued. Respect shown by boss but not by CEO, cold clinical
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P Senior mgr
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Hopeful …initially that something good would come out of it Got good job elsewhere
Disestablished division, disagreed with outcomes of change, relocated to different city, relationships broke up, ‘our function was being devalued’ Low control, expected more ‘horrible feeling of lack of control’ ‘we felt quite useless’ Anxiety, (about ‘whether I would have a job’ concern, disappointment, sadness (about loss of momentum) stress, upset, emotionally draining, tiring, hopeless, then indifferent, dissatisfied
People did not like major restructuring, culture change, terms and conditions, did not think they could ‘make a difference’ as before Loss, uncertainty, demoralising
- Loss of status/position in hierarchy of dept = hugely demoralising on self and team, upset at being under-valued
- It was a takeover – we did not have a chance to share. It was not equal;, we were being seen as the lesser, incredibly unfair ‘When you go through the mechanics of the process with that lack of …consensus’ = hugely stressful Lack of consultation = we felt quite useless, we had no control = anger, frustration, disappointment, then indifferent It was a manipulated process’ …> PJ or IJ? ‘decisions were already taken before they even came to us… not transparent process’ ‘cut out of circulation of papers for comment’
‘Nobody was talking to us about why these things were happening’ ‘I think this team felt that there wasn’t enough of a clear or convincing rationale to explain why those things were happening.’
Some people behaved ‘inappropriately’ ‘Ministry people weren’t interested in listening and understanding what we do’ ‘The ministry was cold-hearted.’ Bosses were supportive, good relationships
Q Senior HR contractor
Restructuring Job redesign redundancies + cultural change
Fun, challenge, new interesting, extension of contract High control
Personal attacks, ‘screaming and yelling’ Sad, disappointed
Excitement - for those who could see benefit, e.g. promotion opportunities, challenge of new role Good outcomes for co.
Churn, fright, crashed, nervousness, stress – for those who foresaw problems with role or redundancy hurt, humiliation, anger, distress, those who lost their supervisory roles and took lower level work or redundancy
Employees said it is not fair I lost my job or got less pay for lower role = hurt, humiliation
Some people said nothing is changing why put us through this stress, some said whole process was unfair, some recruitment process Q – process was participative, ‘people had opportunity to make decisions for themselves’ transparent, training provided, but unfair in that it should have been done much earlier –‘We had to hurt people to do it, achieve it.’ Unfair to use change prog to manage performance issues
Gave full info = transparent. Some did not trust info = anger + aggression We could have articulated more what was going to be different. Senior mgt also really wanted reduced headcount but we did not say so– this was not honest
Q though fair, some employees thought so too (‘I felt I was listened to’), others not = anger, tears, yelling Q as change leader also though her boss was fair
R Senior HR
Restructuring De-merger
It built credibility High degree of satisfaction in seeing people change High control
Increased workload Pressure, tired Anxiety – would it work?
The majority gained Happy if remuneration went up People were getting feedback Interest, excitement, pleasure, appreciation
Unhappy if remuneration went down Shock, horror, fear, apathy
Outcomes were new processes + outcomes of those processes = salary increase/no increase, performance feedback. Q= fair Employees = happy + unhappy
Workshops, consultation, got buy in, reworked drafts …> Q = fair, backed up by survey settling, stabilizing, reassuring ‘hidden things.. deals that had been done before’ = new transparency
Workshops, full info Shared info with CEO
R appreciated thanks, gratitude Support from CEO Not always treated fairly by some senior people, partners = frustration
S Senior mgr
Restructuring
Opportunity Significance of role has been confirmed (status) High control
Process of managing change was tough, draining
Increased resp., higher level Relief for those who wanted reduced role
Unhappiness for those who got reduced roles
S= fair for all With others - discussion, consultation, agreement, transparent, no hidden agendas I was consulted
Fair = pleased Fair, but could have offered me more encouragement at times
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T Employee then manager
Relocation to new town
Opportunity excitement Promoted More money more later when became manager
Shock, fear (reloc) Little control earlier…
Those who moved got more money, those who stayed behind got good jobs elsewhere
Some were made redundant – no payout ‘bad feeling’, traumatic
mostly fair but frustration working with clients
Mostly fair but no consultation Not given full picture of assignment and some of the difficulties
Yes = pride when given promo
U Shop assist.
Merger Relaxed when no redundancies were announced Low control and no expectation of any
Understaffed when some left due to take over
Some did not want to work under new manager and left Uncertainty, nervousness
fair Fair
Fair Another co: told had time to look for jobs then this was radically shortened -felt cheated, surprised, anxious
Fair but very brief
V Sports facilitat
Restructure Suspension Dismissal
Won his case, got compensation
Lost money, drank more, took a job he did not want Low control Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry > relieved (outcome/process)
Various stakeholders were perceived to have lost from his dismissal
having to apply for part of his restructured role and took computer, suspension, dismissal negotiation, court case concern for finances, family
Little hope pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry, hurt, uncertainty. Outcome…
Very unfair – hearing of change from outsiders first, no consultation, having to apply for part of his restructured role + took computer, suspension, (no opportunity to respond to charges) dismissal, negotiation, court case Little hope, pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry, hurt, uncertainty, surprise process
unclear who would be affected and how, suspension, dismissal, lied to as to why computer had been taken outsiders heard of changes before employees info given earlier contradicted by info later (nature of role) <…emotions for all types of injustice…….>
in one meeting with lawyers he started to thump the table ‘Quite abrupt and abusive in meetings’
W Senior HR
Restructure Redundancy Job redsign Tech change (context) others
Opportunity to showcase change mgt skills = interest High control
More work, travel Frustration people had not embraced change (process)
Better career options + opportunities Enthusiasm but also some relief…> Good for co.
Redundancy Some lost mgt positions <..Anger, frustration…
Fair (best people got redesigned jobs)
Fair, consultation, ‘inclusive’ but some employees took PGs and some may have [incorrectly] thought they were being singled out or victimised W satisfaction, pride
Mostly but could not disclose dire financial position for business reasons… ‘normally I would advocate full disclosure’
We tried to treat people with respect and dignity
X Security guard
Building expansion Work schedules
Got training, permanent position, salary increase = happy (salary increase for some years not others) …>
No control Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy Missed out on promotion = cried IT no login, emails ‘We felt we were left out’
Good for organization Got training Improved facilities
Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy
Unfair – extra work, no extra pay = cheated, unhappy Walk to parking or pay = stress Customer abuse Perm job + training = fair, happy Not promoted = unfair…> = self-doubt, unworthy Training = fair IT no login, emails ‘We felt we were left out’
Low control – ‘no consultation, no consent’ ‘There was no point in asking questions. You have to really humbly accept what is dished out to you’ No application, just appointment = unworthy Nepotism
Fair - museum expansion told what was happening, to expect some difficulties, regular updates, + carpark, training, perm position Unfair – not told about promotion issue, dishonesty about reasons for not being promoted = cried Alleged deliberately excluded form some meetings when info was change was given –‘that made me feel left out’
Partly, not when wanting to go to doctor (new manager but not directly change-related = angry “She would say some smart thing – ‘who is going to look after your position’” Perceived systemic injustice
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Y Small bus owner
Office move High control As owner: business grew Excitement, pride, comfortable that I could deal with extra work but…
Extra work, more travel Some anxiety, stress
Good for organization Busy, variety, enjoying their work Less travel for most staff
More travel for some staff
Pay rise –partly because of travel Everybody was involved in the work done on the new premises
Fair Fair
Observations
1. All four types of justice were found. 2. Most reported fairness and unfairness 3. People who lead change (i.e. have control, influence) tend to think most of it is fair. Unfairness for leaders and managers of change is minimal and usually seen as situational (could tell staff of dire financial position) and/or in the control of others. 4. One can detect an element of pride in doing things fairly 5. These people also seem high in EI, sincere, genuine. 6. Unfavourable outcomes often lead to perceptions of unfair outcomes, but not always. 7. Unfavourable and unfair outcomes are usually seen as due to unfair processes. 8. Not always easy for participant OR ME to separate or categorise type of justice. Ask people one type and they may answer for another. Some statements were not probed .e.g. ‘the process was not open enough’ (Proc J or Info J?) 9. E.g. from above – outcomes can be new processes but are DJ-related, change workshop + consultation = PJ & Info J? 10. Notions of unfairness gauged from specific questions on fairness and through answers to other questions 11. Issues of fairness not always related to change itself, e.g. unfair actions of new manager (but be seen to be change-related by interviewees) 12. Participants at times give benefit of the doubt to justice issues in the sense that the person creating injustice may have been pushed into it by those higher up.
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Questions 24-29 Emotion management
Ptc.
Code
+ role
Type of
change
Outcomes
for self
+ ve
& control
Outcomes
for self – ve
& control
Outcomes for
others + ve
Outcomes for
others
- ve
24
Show emotions
25
Hide emotions
26
Manage own
emotions
27
Generate emotions
in others
28
Manage others
emotions
29
Emotions change
over time
A Senior manager
Restructuring
Less influence/ Responsibility ‘Sense of loss’ ‘sadness’ Lower job satisfaction low control and expected more
Some mgrs like less respons. ‘relief’
Not asked…but ‘I said that I felt I didn’t belong, that I felt let down’ but said he did not really express feelings contradiction? ‘I had to put on a brave face’ ‘I was very upfront about how I felt’
“it’s what the company employs me to do. You know, as a professional, I like to act as such. It is very hard. I hid my views from junior staff’ …..>?
‘being professional and focusing on … the company’s objectives’ ‘deliberately tried to reframe… to look for the benefits.. I tell myself…that’s life’
Not asked but ‘Identify the positives’
Not asked Grief cycle ‘They’ve diminished with time’ sadness, grief, distress, trepidation, loss, disenfranchised, disenachanted, - indifference
B Junior HR
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy
Career opportunity Hugely energising Redund payout
‘I burnt out’ (from the work and conflict) Good for CEO+GMs low control and expected more ‘It pushed me to the point where I broke and it changed my life.’ - I had to work 80-90 hours per week. I didn’t have a day off for months at a time.
Redundancy package Some got good jobs elsewhere
Redundancy ‘People were suspicious, they felt betrayed’ ‘Middle managers were gutted’ staff were ‘absolutely devasted)
‘I put up with a bit of that (abuse) ‘I was being paid to do what I was being paid to do. And so I couldn’t go and say what I really thought’ Senior managers: were they aware?)‘No. I wasn’t at all good at verbalizing negatives things in a framed or rational way. I mean my way of dealing with it would be to scream at somebody at that point because I would just explode at them. I didn’t have a level of emotional maturity’
And I felt bad that I was having to go and spout this stuff but I knew it wasn’t really the whole story. I felt compromised. I felt a bit dirty.
Employees - Violent, aggressive, menace, abusive, swearing ‘I actually enjoy the process of helping people comes to terms with the emotions around change’
First energised, then startled, angry, furious, ‘maelstrom of anxiety, exhausted beyond emotional, burnt out’, stress, depression
C Senior manager
Take over: division sold Location move Redundancy for some others
New co. committed to expansion of mnf Severance package Some control ‘relaxed’ about the new employers ‘Positive people’ Pleased, less stressful than The company
‘disappointed’ to leave company after 33 years. Redund was stressful Some control Lower remuneration Lousy office Job had less challenge Lower job satisfaction
Some made redundant ‘shock, dismay, real concern’
Expected – no Tried to be +ve, diffic with redundan.
No – “I was reasonably open with my emotions’ But… ‘I’d learnt not to talk about those things at that level with my bosses over the years’
Tried to remain positive
Not expected but tried to be enthusiastic abt some aspects, concerned abt others
Expected no -You had to be sensitive. Good pay +ve
First stressful, anxious (process) then more relaxed once decision had been made (outcome) also sad to leave, disappointed. with some outcomes – nature of job, office, pleased with new people, culture high EI
360
D HR consultant
Redundancy Started own business ‘in hindsight it was a favour’ It was a real cathartic exercise. It made me move on mentally’
No control Move back to remun or redundant ‘distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out, angry
Got a shock because there had been no redundancies before
Not asked I am English –‘stiff upper lip…one must always be polite at all times but I did tell them I was upset. ‘I wanted to howl but I wouldn’t do that.’ ‘You try not to show your emotions’
‘I am English –‘stiff upper lip…one must always be polite at all times… I spoke to colleagues, told them I was upset
N/a N/a Shock, horror, anger, upset, some hope, ‘it was real cathartic exercise’
E Senior HR
Restructure ‘Satisfaction’ helped build relationships, exert influence- High control ..but note comments on ‘circle of concern v circle of influence’
Extra work ‘Stress’ But little other emotional impact
Good for co. More jobs Some got better positions Grief acceptance
Some redundancies One big loser at senior level cycle Shock denial
No –but ‘expected to demonstrate support’…then expected to be positive but sensitive to those losing
Not voice neg emo publicly ‘I usually keep my mouth shut’
‘You build in mechanisms to cope…Work through priorities, filter out what you need, put in the hours.’ See ‘circle of concern v circle of influence’ ‘Pick up my corporate hat’ Another org. ‘I have never been so exhausted in my entire life and so depressed because we’d just shattered so many lives’
Enthusiasm, acceptance – but not false enthusiasm
‘There is always emotional impact’ “People have an infinite ability to cope with change’ Grief cycle Quell negative emotions of others ‘You are gong to need a of TLC’ If change is –ve > neg emo All change involves pain
First ambivalence, then some stress, frustration, satisfaction, High EI – + p + p23
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
Restructure = transfer
Got into new career (HR) silver lining anticipation looking forward
Little control ‘being done unto and left to clean up mess’ black cloud ‘royal pain in the neck’ distressing’ trepidation, concern’ Transition phase was ‘bloody horrible’
Relief (ownership issue) Some got good roles.
Some redundancy
No Expectation to be professional
Re-establish some clarity of what was expected’ Talked to wife & support people, inc. mentor, got on with job
No Another org. Need to generate enthusiasm and got frustrated when it didn’t work, also satisfied
‘Royal pain in the neck’, distress, anger, Going into new HR role…trepidation, concern, anticipation, later felt OK
G Senior HR
Branch closed = redundancy for others
Pride, because no PGs High control
Extra work, extra travel, ‘Stress’ anxiety, nervousness meeting deadlines
Got other jobs Excellent redundancy package
Redundancy ‘pissed off, angry ‘stressed’, ‘personal grieving process Extra work for HO staff
Compassion ‘No – that would not be honest’
‘We needed commitment, engagement, loyalty’ - hope
Have a beer, speak to colleagues, in ‘peer supervision’, talk to boss, partner
Trauma, anxiety, anger, denial
Some stress, anxiety, pride
H GM then senior mgr
Ownership change. Job change finally left
Low control expected much more Reported to own subordinate Lost authority, status, ‘shock’ ‘indignant’ (IT change) Excluded from social functions
Subordinate got GM job Owners got their man in charge
No – I was expected to do as I was told
Yes I find it hard to be an actor. I tend to wear my emotions on my sleeve. I found it difficult not to show my emotions – frustration, shock
Not too good –I was upset, I had an emotional outburst. I did not manage up. I lost. But did not feel emotions about other changes, technology, office move etc – ‘these were straightforward transactions’
Not asked Managing others emotions an implicit part of my role
Seemed to have experienced anxiety, anger, self-doubt
361
J 1st level mgr
Cut costs Low control expected more More work More hours More pressure Anger resentment
Good for client A few redundancies anxiety
no Yes - felt anger, discontent, hid it ‘that’s life’
Confided with colleagues, looked forward to leaving
no implicitly
K HR consultant
From employee to consultant = redundancy
Set up own consultancy and still works for EMA Independent, god money, took 2 yrs
Redundant angry Now more hours Low control ‘sadness’ Drank more
People who stayed got better deal
Anxiety for others affected in same way Others very volatile, very emotive, Another company
Barman would not apply properly for redesigned job, refused lower job, left= sadness
‘You just try and keep it in check for yourself’, be ‘professional’
Talked to colleagues, road running
No asked but gave support Another company You’ve got to treat people how you would like to be treated
Anxiety, some anger? sadness
L HR mgr
13 years of change Job design Culture
Varying degrees of Gained credibility, experience, more senior role after a longer period Happy ending, euphoric
control ‘Dark periods of time’ lost confidence ‘Hard going’ ‘self- doubting questioning’ ‘Undermined’ confusion, anger’ outcomes+process
Mgrs had to be more consultative
Anxiety for other person Sadness when she left Possibly guilt if she had contributed to bad feelings p14
no ‘Always’, culture very ‘stiff upper lip’ ‘As a woman operating in senior management role’ Cried - ‘You’re soft, that’s not something that’s done’ “I tried never, ever, to cry again’ I do care a lot about people’s feelings and I don’t like to hurt people’….>
Focus on job, gym, acting/theatre ………………….
Other aspect of change - needed to be positive but ‘if you’re feeling a bit low the last thing you want to be doing is a big ra-ra …………………….
Definitely, role model, ‘if people were feeling negative about the change you had to turn it round and make them positive’ = expectation ……………………>
Emotionally grounded, turmoil, (self-)doubting, dark periods of time, confusion, anger, happy ending, elated euphoric, emotional rollercoaster Hi EI – able to artic own emotions, empathy for others, ability to manage highs and lows
M Senior mgr
Restructure + redundancy self
Could have got what seemed bigger role Big redundancy payout Redundancy = opportunity = relief, excitement Varying degrees of Planned own exit
... but wasn’t ‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ ‘got nowhere’ self-doubt Lower job satisfaction Own redundancy Difficult when people’s families phones (others’ redundancies) control expected more
Some got new roles, bigger roles Some lost roles they could not cope with
MD +others made redundant Others anxiety – roller coaster
No – expected to be +ve but ‘I wouldn’t say that was emotional’ – be factual, party line
‘I’m always expected to hide emotion.’ Colleague: ‘You need to watch it’. People can see what you feel. But I don’t generally dissolve in floods of tears’ “I did not talk about my personal feelings.’
Stick to facts and support staff being made redundant, focusing on reality
Ambivalent as to expectations but sees it as role that needs to be played
You feel for people that being made redundant, focusing on helping that person get through [see transcript for more]
Disgruntled, frustration, guilt, doubt, shame, anger, devastation, relief, excitement Roller coaster
362
N GM
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy others
Came in as new GM and had to drive the process ‘the impact to me personally was nil’ High control Little emotion
Had to manage difficult processes Had to deal with insults
Some transferred to new co and got paid slightly extra Supervisors had fewer reports and less responsibility/ hassle+ = relief?
- Some were made redundant or redeployed Disbelief, denial, nervousness, anger, acceptance - managers were nervous, anxious when facing affected employees
Be positive but not upbeat or downbeat, simply about communicating the message
No – but provide trained professionals to support to people
Talk to colleagues, boss
Be positive but not upbeat or downbeat
“you see people in organisations putting on very brave faces’ but some are ‘falling apart inside’ The quiet head down is the person who has the breakdown’
Little own emo, but some sadness, anxiety For high EI also see p 7,8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 18,19
O employee
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Got another job elsewhere before leaving Relief when process was clarified= certainty
Made redundant and got redund pay Stressful Lack of control: I don’t like being a passenger Anger, frustration
Senior people gained Some junior people got redeployed Relief when not made redundant
Those made redundant One was traumatized, crying, frightened
no No – “I didn’t feel like I could not express myself.’
Gym, exercise No I think I was expected by my manager to support colleague who was struggling emotionally
Frustration, stress, anger, > gratefulness, relief
P Senior mgr
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Hopeful …initially that something good would come out of it Got good job elsewhere
Disestablished division, disagreed with outcomes of change, relocated to different city, relationships broke up, ‘our function was being devalued’ Low control, expected more ‘horrible feeling of lack of control’ ‘we felt quite useless’ we had no influence over the process, felt disempowered and basically just conned. Anxiety, (about ‘whether I would have a job’ concern, disappointment, sadness (about loss of momentum) stress, upset, emotionally draining, tiring, hopeless, then indifferent, dissatisfied
People did not like major restructuring, culture change, terms and conditions, did not think they could ‘make a difference’ as before Loss, uncertainty, demoralising
Implicitly yes Be positive, esp change leader/mgr
yes ‘implicitly I felt it necessary to internalise and not pass on all the conflict that was happening in the design process’
‘I am pretty disciplined’ ..sound off to my manager to express frustration, colleagues, family, friends’ ‘this sector used to change we take it as part of the game’ = freq, = previous change
No – ‘I wouldn’t have taken on the job if they expected me to engender and foster commitment to it as well.’
No Hopeful…>concern, disappointment, sadness, stress, upset, hugely angry, emotionally draining, tiring, incredibly hopeless, then indifferent, dissatisfied
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Q Senior HR contractor Ch leader
Restructuring Job redesign redundancies + cultural change
Fun, challenge, new interesting, extension of contract High control
Personal attacks, ‘screaming and yelling’ Sad, disappointed
Excitement - for those who could see benefit, e.g. promotion opportunities, challenge of new role Good outcomes for co.
Churn, fright, crashed, nervousness, stress – for those who foresaw problems with lower role or redundancy hurt, humiliation, anger, distress, those who lost their supervisory roles and took lower level work or redundancy
No – but I did when I thought it was appropriate
Told to be less enthusiastic – too strong, too passionate Had to cater to those feeling negative Surprised that she was considered to come across a ‘bit hard’ <…>
Talked as a team ‘Used to it, battle-hardened’
Some enthusiasm but not too much ‘We expected people to be caring and supportive and reasonable’
they’re angry but they just can’t get past it and you just have to take all that anger and emotion and tears and yelling and all those sorts of things and just keep pushing the message out, support them whichever way they can take it really.’ ‘We had a lot of emotion to deal with’
Excitement, empathy, frustration, sadness Contradiction -‘but…for me it wasn’t an extremely emotional time’ high EI
R Senior HR Ch leader
Restructuring De-merger
It built credibility High degree of satisfaction in seeing people change High control
Increased workload Pressure, tired Anxiety – would it work?
The majority gained Happy if remuneration went up People were getting feedback Interest, excitement, pleasure, appreciation
Unhappy if remuneration went down Shock, horror, fear, apathy
You just had to get tough Expected to be enthusiastic
Hide frustration ‘He [CEO] knew what I chose to share’ = EI, EL
Reflect, talk to friends, HR colleagues (Try not to take this stuff home)
Expected to get engagement, acceptance
‘there was some sort of fear of displaying emotion in the meeting’ but they would be excited outside the meeting.
Shock, horror, excitement, inspiring, anxiety, frustration highly satisfying = ‘cycle of emotions’ high EI
S Senior mgr Ch leader
Restructuring
Opportunity Significance of role has been confirmed (status) High control
Process of managing change was tough, draining
Increased resp., higher level Relief for those who wanted reduced role
Unhappiness for those who got reduced roles
‘I needed to be persuasive’ but ‘I had to be firm and resolute’ ‘I believe I need to show empathy’
Expect it of myself - tiredness, impatience. frustration
Walking, reading, talking to friends, reflecting
No – the yes = be positive, enthusiastic
‘I had to manage managers who were not coping emotionally’ grieving process Expected - yes high EI –‘I was very close to my people.’
Empathy, frustration, excitement, draining, pleased
T Employee then manager
Relocation to new town
Opportunity excitement Promoted More money more later when became manager
Shock, fear (reloc) Little control earlier…
Those who moved got more money, those who stayed behind got good jobs elsewhere
Some were made redundant – no payout ‘bad feeling’, traumatic
No No Had support of partner, played sport, social activities
Yes “encourage the troops”, motivate them
Implicit part of the job Fear, excitement, stress, frustration, pride
U Shop assist. Ch rec
Merger Relaxed when no redundancies were announced Low control and no expectation of any
Understaffed when some left due to take over
Some did not want to work under new manager and left Uncertainty, nervousness
No No Consider other options: ‘Nothing much I can do. I will wait and see what will happen. If there’s something that looks not really good or I can go for other areas or do other things. There’s always opportunities outside. It’s not the end of the world.’
No No Some anxiety > relaxed
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V Sports facilitat
Restructure Suspension Dismissal
Won his case, got compensation
Lost money, drank more, took a job he did not want Low control Surprise, Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anger, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry > relieved (outcome/process
Various stakeholders were perceived to have lost from his dismissal
No Yes –with regard to announcement on first day about restructure
I just kept focusing on a good outcome, got legal and emotional advice from lawyer/ cousin., support from family
n/a n/a Surprise, anger, Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry > relieved
W Senior HR
Restructure Redundancy Job redsign Tech change (context) others
Opportunity to showcase change mgt skills = interest High control
More work, travel Frustration people had not embraced change (process)
Better career options + opportunities Enthusiasm but also some relief…> Good for co.
Redundancy Some lost mgt positions <..Anger, frustration…
No No -only if mgt thought they would be different to party line but I did hide my emotions from staff – but not fellow managers
venting those frustrations with management behind the scenes, with my own HR colleagues, I would have probably gone home and vented my frustrations
No Yes – and believes he has skills in change Very perceptive about others’ emotions
Enthusiasm, frustration Good EI
X Security guard
Building expansion Work schedules
Got permanent position, salary increase due to position = happy
No general salary change, pay for exp No control Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy Missed out on promotion = cried
Good for organization Got training Improved facilities
Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy
No I cried in annual > review But expected to hide negative emotions – if not you became a target – you were always to pretend and show if nothing is affecting you and things are all good and going well’
Suppressing them Have a joke and talk among ourselves ‘tried to push it to the back’ Support and concern from colleagues Sometimes family were sympathetic, sometimes did not realize tensions X was suffering from
No No – we did give each other support
Hope, happiness = perm pos + training unhappiness over neg outcomes and processes
Y Small bus owner
Office move High control As owner: business grew Excitement, pride
Extra work, more travel Some anxiety, stress
Good for organisation Less travel for most staff
More travel for some staff
There was no selling – but there was a positive approach
I always hide my negative emotions – reasons of morale
‘Can’t answer that.’ ‘I don’t. It just happens. I don’t know how to do that’ - just get with the job.
Noted excitement, pride in others
Said he was not emotional and contradicted himself
Excitement, pride, Some anxiety, stress
Observations
1. My assessment of EI and EL based on entire transcript and specific questions Q24-29. 2. Some participants use cognitively-oriented words not emotions. 3. Some use emotion-laden words such as compromised, betrayed, dirty, doubting, distrust, integrity, disengaged, detached 4. Intensity seems greater when people lack control. 5. Intensity seems greater when people refer to own outcomes rather than those of others. 6. Participants sometimes contradict themselves – at times possibly due to thinking of different aspects of an organisational change. 7. For managers – showing, hiding and managing own emotions, and generating and managing emotions of others, was seldom an explicit expectation of organisation, sometimes an implicit expectation, and sometimes what participants thought was the appropriate thing to do. 8. Hiding own emotions often seen as professional. For some an aspect of personality. For other related to org culture – not just change related. 9. Emotion management: coping skills are emotion focused (talk to people, gym, reframe, etc) and problem focused (get on with the job, put in the time, ‘just do it)’. 10. Evidence of EL 11. Leaders and managers seem high in EI – specifically empathy, awareness of own emotion – but not always able to label emotions. = Anomaly
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Questions 30-33 Behaviour
Ptc.
Code +
role
Type of
change
Outcomes for
self
+ ve
& control
Outcomes for
self – ve
& control
Outcomes for
others + ve
Outcomes for
others
- ve
30
Actions expected
31
Actions taken
32
Why actions taken
33
Resistance
A Senior manager
Restructuring Less influence/ Responsibility ‘Sense of loss’ ‘sadness’ Lower job satisfaction low control and expected more
Some mgrs like less respons. ‘relief’
Go along with the change ‘I acted as professionally as I could’ “I hid my views from junior staff’ Did query nature of change with GM and argued against them….>
‘I’ve got to make changes’ “it’s what the company employs me to do. You know, as a professional, I like to act as such. It is very hard.’Did not agree with changes, felt left out “I didn’t believe I had any realistic opportunities to affect the change and therefore chose not to even try…and I felt a sense of grief’
“I had to say , well, no, I think that is wrong’ ‘I said I felt I had been let down, promises not delivered on. I told him I’d given up reminding him.’ Psych C ‘My manager was a bit surprised I felt strongly’
B Junior HR
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy
Career opportunity Redund payout
‘I burnt out’ (from the work and conflict) Good for CEO+GMs low control and expected more ‘It pushed me to the point where I broke and it changed my life.’ - I had to work 80-90 hours per week. I didn’t have a day off for months at a time.
Redundancy package Some got good jobs elsewhere
Redundancy ‘People were suspicious, they felt betrayed’ ‘Middle managers were gutted’ staff were ‘absolutely devastated
Design a redundancy programme Put in whatever hours were necessary 80-90 hours pw ‘No clear framework or guidelines’
Did what was expected. Also “lost my temper… absolutely blew up”
“I didn’t know what else to do” “I had an overwhelming sense of I need to please... and responsibility. If somebody gave me a task I took it incredibly seriously” ‘I was being paid to do what I was being paid to do. And so I couldn’t go and say what I really thought.’
Not asked – probably did not resist change. < (see p19)
C Senior manager
Take over: division sold Location move Redundancy for some others
New co. committed to expansion of mnf Severance package Some control ‘relaxed’ about the new employers ‘Positive people’ Pleased, less stressful than the company
‘disappointed’ to leave company after 33 years. Redund was stressful Some control Lower remuneration Lousy office Job had less challenge Lower job satisfaction
Some made redundant ‘shock, dismay, real concern’
Manage new role, including answering customer problems
Yes ‘What were the options?..You do what you are asked.’ ‘I am reasonably flexible.’ I tend to work with it rather than against it.’ ‘I’d learnt not to talk about those things at that level with my bosses over the years’
Did not like certain aspects of job or office, but no resistance. “I thought it was crazy stuff at times.”
D HR consultant
Redundancy Started own business ‘in hindsight it was a favour’ It was a real cathartic exercise. It made me move on mentally’
No control Move back to remun or redundant ‘distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out, angry
Got a shock because there had been no redundancies before
Leave immediately – and quietly
No It would look wrong – like a dismissal
Yes – refused to leave immediately, consulted lawyer, negotiated exit package and timing
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E Senior HR
Restructure ‘Satisfaction’ helped build relationships, exert influence- High control ...but note comments on ‘circle of concern v circle of influence’
Extra work ‘Stress’ But little other emotional impact
Good for co. More jobs Some got better positions Grief acceptance
Some redundancies One big loser at senior level cycle Shock denial
Change leader/manager, HR role Visibly support change, be positive about it.
Played expected role Stepped in to make change when he saw something was not being done fairly.
Change leader/manager, HR role, saw benefits
No Saw some in others, delegations of staff, threats – if you do this I will go.
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
Restructure = transfer
Got into new career (HR) silver lining anticipation looking forward
Little control ‘being done unto and left to clean up the mess’ black cloud ‘royal pain in the neck distressing’ trepidation, concern’ Transition phase was ‘bloody horrible’
Relief (ownership issue) Some got good roles.
Some redundancy ‘There was an expectation that those in a formal leadership would be supportive of the change and would promote it…
<… did as expected…> ‘Describe it as being part of being a leader in an organisation. There’s things that you do that you don’t necessarily agree with. But you get on and do.’ But also had plan to move.
and the, professional I guess is the thing is to keep your own thoughts on the matter out of it.’
‘Being reasonably vocal about well that's not going to work. What was intended here? How can we happily still do what we were expected to do under the circumstances? So it was sort of a questioning, challenging sort of strategy I guess.’
G Senior HR
Branch closed = redundancy for others
Pride, because no PGs High control
Extra work, extra travel, ‘Stress’ anxiety, nervousness meeting deadlines
Got other jobs Excellent redundancy package
Redundancy ‘pissed off, angry ‘stressed’, ‘personal grieving process Extra work for HO staff
Lead redundancy as HR mgr. Put in extra hours, more travel
Yes – seemed best practice ‘At the level I am I drive a lot of change’ Change leader
No – contributed to discussion Others resisted change (those who lost jobs)
H GM then senior mgr
Ownership change. Job change finally left
Low control expected much more Reported to own subordinate Lost authority, status ‘shock’ ‘indignant’ (IT change) Excluded from board meetings, governance, social functions
Subordinate got GM job Owners got their man in charge
Expected to resign or comply with lower status job, did so a while then negotiated an exit. Location, technology change: ‘I was happy …I didn’t agree with change but I fully accepted the change and there was no emotion attached to it’ but indignant about IT change
Did not resign as she thought she was being implicitly asked to do. Argued against some of the changes Complied with lower role, negotiated exit
‘it was accepted that while I didn't agree with the change, I accepted that that was the right of the major shareholder to make, to dictate those things.’ ‘Put it this way, I could rationalise those other changes. I might not have agreed with them but there was some rationale behind them which I accepted.’ ‘I couldn't lift my head above that and think right, how do I, how do I manage’ seemed to be losing control and did not know how to regain it
Was not asked about resistance Argued against some of the changes. I did not manage up. I lost. Negotiated exit
J 1st level mgr
Cut costs Low control expected more More work More hours More pressure Anger Resentment
Good for client A few redundancies anxiety
Cut prices
Yes, just do it Paid staff extra for extra time worked Tried to protect them from mgt
“I am remunerated to provide a function which is to work and to fulfill the expectation of the company.”
Yes – ‘voiced my concerns’ to mgt Told colleagues he did not agree with approach Found another job and left.
K HR consultant
From employee to consultant = redundancy
Set up own consultancy and still works for EMA Independent, good money, took 2 yrs
Redundant angry Now more hours Low control ‘sadness’ Drank more
People who stayed got better deal
Anxiety for others affected in same way. They got emotive, volatile Another company
Barman would not apply properly for redesigned job, refused lower job, left= sadness
Accept offer or take redundancy
Took redundancy Other option too risky Argued against it, tried to negotiate a better deal with others, but nothing more
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L HR mgr
10 years of change Job design Culture
Varying degrees of Gained credibility, experience, more senior role after a longer period Happy ending, euphoric
control ‘Dark periods of time’ lost confidence ‘Hard going’ ‘self- doubting questioning’ ‘Undermined’ confusion, anger’ outcomes + process
Mgrs had to be more consultative
Anxiety for other person
Support new person, share the work
Tried very hard not to let anything negative disrupt team.
Good leadership Need to work closely with person ‘Probably because up until that point in my life I’ve always done what’s expected of me pretty much. I’ve always been very conscientious and you know yeah and I think it’s the right thing. I do care a lot about people’s feelings and I don’t like to hurt people’
‘I was very upfront about how I felt’ Went and saw chairman ‘I resisted the way it was done… spoke my mind professionally…challenged it’
M Senior mgr
Restructure + redundancy self
Could have got what seemed bigger role Big redundancy payout Redundancy = opportunity = relief, excitement Varying degrees of Planned own exit
... but wasn’t ‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ ‘got nowhere’ self-doubt Lower job satisfaction Own redundancy Difficult when people’s families phones (others’ redundancies) control expected more
Some got new roles, bigger roles Some lost roles they could not cope with
MD +others made redundant Others anxiety – roller coaster
Accept new role Party line to follow Support the change
First carried on with new role Put forward a structural proposal to exclude himself – negotiated redundancy.
‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ ‘It seem like I’d sort of got nowhere.’ Supported process – ‘In a business you can’t have rogue seniors managers. They should leave… You need to support the business, that’s what you’re paid for.’
‘I debated the structure.’ “I disagreed with it strongly’ “I tend to be fairly vigorous debater’
N GM
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy others
Came in as new GM and had to drive the process ‘the impact to me personally was nil’ High control Little emotion
Had to manage difficult processes Had to deal with insults
Some transferred to new co and got paid slightly extra Supervisors had fewer reports and less responsibility/hassle + = relief?
- Some were made redundant or redeployed Disbelief, denial, nervousness, anger, acceptance - managers were nervous, anxious when facing affected employees
Brought in as GM to implement change Dealt with resistance from staff
Did as expected Significant level of communication Supported staff
Agreed with objectives, accepted role at outset Saw support was necessary
No – change leader/manager ‘It was too far advanced for that’
O employee
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Got another job elsewhere before leaving Relief when process was clarified= certaint
Made redundant and got redund pay Stressful Lack of control: I don’t like being a passenger Anger, frustration
Senior people gained Some junior people got redeployed Relief when not made redundant
Those made redundant One was traumatized, crying, frightened
Attend forums. ‘I guess what was expected was that I wouldn’t be a block in the process, that I would help facilitate it and I thought that was a fair expectation.’
Did as expected. Found another job and negotiated early exit.
‘because I enjoyed what I did but also I have a sense of commitment to what we were trying to achieve and I was clear about the team that I worked in’
‘Not really resisted the change, just expressed some opposition to the lack of clarity around the intention of the review.’
P Senior mgr
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Hopeful …initially that something good would come out of it Got good job elsewhere
Disestablished division, disagreed with outcomes of change, relocated to different city, relationships broke up, ‘our function was being devalued’ Low control, expected more ‘horrible feeling of lack of control’ ‘we felt quite useless’ we had no influence over the
People did not like major restructuring, culture change, terms and conditions, did not think they could ‘make a difference’ as before Loss, uncertainty, demoralising
Expected to support change Do tasks of change management
Did as expected for or a while After 4 moths of the process left for a new job.
‘Because it was part of my job and that was what I had committed to do in taking on the role in being on the design team’ Not satisfied with outcomes. ‘Didn’t feel that I was going to benefit or work well in the kind of organisation we were setting up so I chose to find another one.’ ‘once decisions are made you live with it.’
Argued strongly ‘I was also very clear that there are certain parts in the process where this is our opportunity to argue, to debate, to challenge and we did that during that process but once decisions are made you live with it.’ <…. ‘Ministry, I think we were clear and we didn’t hide what we thought and once the process moved out of design and decisions were made about structure and
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process, felt disempowered and basically just conned. Anxiety, (about ‘whether I would have a job’ huge concern, disappointment, sadness (about loss of momentum) stress, upset, emotionally draining, tiring, hopeless, then indifferent, dissatisfied
implementation, we disengaged.’ Resigned
Q Senior HR con- tractor
Restructuring Job redesign + cultural change
Fun, challenge, new interesting, extension of contract High control
Personal attacks, ‘screaming and yelling’ Sad, disappointed
Excitement - for those who could see benefit, e.g. promotion opportunities, challenge of new role Good outcomes for co.
Churn, fright, crashed, nervousness, stress – for those who foresaw problems with lower role or redundancy hurt, humiliation, anger, distress, those who lost their supervisory roles and took lower level work or redundancy
Led change Redesign + cultural change
Yes ….> Brought in as consultant to manage this change
Minimal since change leader but pushed others to improve process Dealt with resistance from unions and staff, ‘a lot of personal attack’
R Senior HR
Restructuring De-merger Cultural change
It built credibility High degree of satisfaction in seeing people change High control
Increased workload Pressure, tired Anxiety – would it work?
The majority gained Happy if remuneration went up People were getting feedback Interest, excitement, pleasure, appreciation
Unhappy if remuneration went down Shock, horror, fear, apathy
Brought in as HR manager to lead and implement many changes
Yes Hired for this role, knew what was expected from outset
Minimal – aspects of timing Dealt with resistance from some partners and staff
S Senior mgr
Restructuring
Opportunity Significance of role has been confirmed (status) High control
Process of managing change was tough, draining
Increased resp., higher level Relief for those who wanted reduced role
Unhappiness for those who got reduced roles
Lead change Did what was expected but her manager felt she was not moving quickly enough for non-performers <…
No Dealt with resistance from those who lost status –‘resisted reporting to me’
T Employee then manager
Relocation to new town
Opportunity excitement Promoted More money more later when became manager
Shock, fear (reloc) Little control earlier…
Those who moved got more money, those who stayed behind got good jobs elsewhere
Some were made redundant – no payout ‘bad feeling’, traumatic
First tasks Later take on management role
Did as expected This was part of my job Not in beginning but began to resent management style of boss ‘I spoke my mind but it fell on deaf ears.’ Others resisted relocation and left organisation
U Shop assist.
Merger Relaxed when no redundancies were announced Low control and no expectation of any
Understaffed when some left due to take over
Some did not want to work under new manager and left Uncertainty, nervousness
Carry on as normal Did as expected Role had not changed No
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V Sports facilitat
Restructure Suspension Dismissal
Won his case, got compensation
Lost money, drank more, took a job he did not want Low control Surprise, Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anger, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry > relieved (outcome/process
Concerned for impact on stakeholders
Restructure - simply expected to see manager if he had questions Suspension/dismissal- be compliant
No – sent out emails to other stakeholders – keep them informed ‘I thought that the people could lobby somewhere to ensure that there wasn’t too much drastic change’ Engaged lawyer, went though mediation and employment court
Concerned for own job and impact on stakeholders Unfair outcome and process
Yes <… Yes <…
W Senior HR
Restructure Redundancy Job redsign Tech change (context) others
Opportunity to showcase change mgt skills = interest High control
More work, travel Frustration people had not embraced change (process)
Better career options + opportunities Enthusiasm but also some relief…> Good for co.
Redundancy Some lost mgt positions <..Anger, frustration…
Change leader with HR role Probably did more than expected
he had change management experience and skills
No – change leader role but was reluctant to some things that were needed for employee morale and ‘clean up messes’ Dealt with significant employee resistance, including middle management – legal action taken
X Security guard
Building expansion Work schedules
Got permanent position, salary increase due to position = happy
No general salary change, pay for exp No control Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy Missed out on promotion = cried
Good for organization Got training Improved facilities
Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy
‘expected to co-operate with the management and work with whatever orders were given to us’
Yes Agreed with some of objectives – expansion of museum
No – did not feel comfortable voicing opinion with supervisor in case ‘you became a target’ (see Turnley and Feldman 1998, p 78” Management never wants to hear about problems. You are labeled a troublemaker if you bring up any negatives.”) ‘We did not put in a petition or anything like that’ Queried lack of promotion
Y Small bus owner
Office move High control As owner: business grew Excitement, pride
Extra work, more travel Some anxiety, stress
Good for organisation Less travel for most staff
More travel for some staff
n/a = business owner n/a = business owner n/a = business owner No resistance from others
Observations
1. This section has to be read in conjunction with emotion management, e.g. I tried to be positive. Put a positive spin on change. Be enthusiastic. These are usually behaviours. 2. The four questions asked here can produce overlapping answers. E.g. resistance (33) is the opposite of do what is expected (30). 3. Many participants said they did not resist the change but on probing indicated that they had challenged management, voiced their dissatisfaction, but either got on with the job or left. 4. Managers believe they should ‘act professionally’, do what is expected, even if they have negative thoughts, feelings. Cange leaders logically don’t resist change but perhaps argue against some aspects. 5. Resistance to change stems from: perceived negative outcomes for self and others, unfair outcomes and processes, not in the best interests of the organisation. 6. Resistance seen as behavioral – but did follow questions about behaviour. 7. Managers had to deal with resistance from others – this had emotional ramifications, especially if it got unpleasant. 8. Overall – even if there was cognitive and affective resistance there was little behavioural resistance form most participants.
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Questions 34-36 + 42 Personality, previous experience, personal factors outside organisation, other factors
Ptc.
Code
+ role
Type of
change
Outcomes for
self
+ ve
& control
Outcomes for
self – ve
& control
Outcomes for
others + ve
Outcomes for
others
- ve
34
Personality
35
Previous experience
36
Personal factors outside
organisation
42
Other factors
A Senior manager
Restructuring Less influence/ Responsibility ‘Sense of loss’ ‘sadness’ Lower job satisfaction low control and expected more
Some mangers like less responsibility ‘relief’
Change - ‘It all depends on whether I’m the architect of change or whether I’m having the change imposed on me. No I think I cope, change I enjoy. I normally enjoy change. I enjoy variety.’ Need to act professionally
Used to be consulted on change, therefore felt more disenfranchised
X Variable support ‘no major dramas’
B Junior HR
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy
Career opportunity Hugely energising Redund payout Outplacement programme used by others – got a lot satisfaction Got MBA fees paid
‘I burnt out’ (from the work and conflict) Good for CEO+GMs low control and expected more ‘It pushed me to the point where I broke and it changed my life.’ I had to work 80-90 hours per week. I didn’t have a day off for months at a time. Had not been given time off fo MBA
Redundancy package Some got good jobs elsewhere
Redundancy ‘People were suspicious, they felt betrayed’ ‘Middle managers were gutted’ staff were ‘absolutely devasted
Change -‘I’m quite change embracing… I’m very changeable…I don’t find the spectre of change to be scary. I find it really exciting and I like to embrace change.’ But less so if someone else is in control p17 ‘The culture was aggressive and nasty and I didn’t like that, mostly because I was turning into that myself’ Pace – ‘I like things moving fast… I like volume.’ ‘I actually enjoy the process of helping people come to terms with the emotions around change.’ See p17
‘I really needed help. I was drowning. I wasn’t mature enough to recognise it in myself’ Only been in HR a couple of years but had worked in stressful jobs with conflict. In restaurants you changed jobs all the time… “I never had any problems with being quite fluid’ Made me more tolerant of the bad stuff than I should have been, but I probably just covered it up.’
Abusive childhood. Nervous breakdown at 15. Violent father - you did not say no. Depression . Medication. Counseling. “And that was my upbringing that did that because as far as my father was concerned you know, he was quite violent and aggressive and physically violent with me so yeah that was never an option. So any figure of authority I would never go back to him on that kind of stuff so, that very much made me easy pickings to take advantage of.”
Replacement in previous role got $2000 more = ‘slap in the face’ Boss did not want her to take this project. Boss lowered salary and status for the project role. Offered only $500 extra at the end. ‘She didn’t like me and I didn’t like her’ ‘There was some real personal stuff for me going into that role.’ .
C Senior manager
Take over: division sold Location move Redundancy for some others
New co. committed to expansion of mnf Severance package Some control ‘relaxed’ about the new employers ‘Positive people’ Pleased, less stressful than The company
‘disappointed’ to leave company after 33 years. Redund was stressful Some control Lower remuneration Lousy office Job had less challenge Lower job satisfaction
Some made redundant ‘shock, dismay, real concern’
Change - ‘I’m a relatively relaxed person.’ ‘quite flexible’ ‘the guy who runs the business has a right to run it the way he prefers. I guess if you don’t like it the option is to go somewhere else. But I tend to work with it rather than against it.’ I don’t make change easily but…I’m quite relaxed about making change.’ [contradiction] ‘I won’t sort of chop and change every five minutes but I will change’ ‘Everything I do is considered and if change is necessary I will make it = clarification
Probably subconsciously but I can’t think of an example’ Came to believe that ‘nothing stays the same for very long and the only constant is change.’ Not in a specific way but ‘taught me not to resist it.’
x General atmosphere at The company had been negative. Future of company was not positive.
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D HR consultant
Redundancy Started own business ‘in hindsight it was a favour’ It was a real cathartic exercise. It made me move on mentally’
No control Move back to remun or redundant ‘distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out, angry
Got a shock because there had been no redundancies before
Change - ‘I always say I hate change and I do and yet when I look back on my life I do tend to go for things that require change’ ’ [contradiction] ‘I do dislike change but once I’ve gone through the pros and cons and I think it is a good idea then I move on’ = clarification ‘I don’t believe people should stay in the same job for too long without trying to add to their skills.’
x ‘told my mother and she said I was stupid, I’d never make a business woman. (impact unclear)
E Senior HR
Restructure ‘Satisfaction’ helped build relationships, exert influence- High control ...but note comments on ‘circle of concern v circle of influence’
Extra work ‘Stress’ But little other emotional impact
Good for co. More jobs Some got better positions Grief acceptance
Some redundancies One big loser at senior level cycle Shock denial
Change - ‘I’m inclined to almost distance it, but having said that others love to spend their time worrying about what is beyond their ability to influence so it depends on personality.’ Comfortable with it ‘I have one team member who is change aversive’
Yes 15 years of managing change = ‘without sounding conceited a sense of wisdom’
x x
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
Restructure = transfer
Got into new career (HR) silver lining anticipation looking forward
Little control ‘being done unto and left to clean up the mess’ black cloud ‘royal pain in the neck distressing’ trepidation, concern’ Transition phase was ‘bloody horrible’
Relief (ownership issue) Some got good roles.
Some redundancy Change - More flexible now but ‘I don’t like surprises’.
x Family commitments Moved to new role in organisation before restructuring of his division was complete
G Senior HR
Branch closed = redundancy for others
Pride, because no PGs High control
Extra work, extra travel, ‘Stress’ anxiety, nervousness meeting deadlines
Got other jobs Excellent redundancy package
Redundancy ‘pissed off, angry ‘stressed’, ‘personal grieving process Extra work for HO staff
Change - Prefers status quo but thinks of need for change –‘considered approach’ “I am not that demonstrative’
Lots of experience as change manager and consultant –‘gave me a few clues what not to do and not to do.’ Mostly been driving change (p7
More travel missed family events (stress) = result of change Divorced before but not during this change
Other issues facing business at same time, competition, IT issues, new financial management system
H GM then senior mgr
Ownership change. Job change finally left
Low control expected much more Reported to own subordinate Lost authority, status ‘shock’ ‘indignant’ (IT change) Excluded from social functions
Subordinate got GM job Owners got their man in charge
Change - I am normally quite comfortable’ but it depends on context. ‘I tend to wear my emotions on my sleeve.’ Trying to control this. Other – ‘I find it hard to be an actor. [EL]‘I am quite a resilient person’ but this time I didn’t seem to have the resilience’ ‘Things always happen for a reason’ Know that something positive comes from change = optimism? But get frustrated when change is wrong or ridiculous.
Previous change was mostly positive – this was not … ‘It was a change I wasn’t used to.’ Know that something positive comes out of change but there was long lag this time.
Had a young child – not a major issue
New chair was a banker who worked for H’s grandfather
372
J 1st level mgr
Cut costs Low control expected more More work More hours More pressure Anger resentment
Good for client A few redundancies anxiety
Change - ‘My attitude to change is that it’s expected and it’s going to happen anyway so it’s not the change, its how we respond to the change.’ ‘I find change to be natural and expected.’
‘I suppose so’ -‘My family life is not good also. I don’t have a work-life balance because of all this pressure.’ - Birth of child - Sickness of mother - ‘I’m naturally dedicated to my work so it was really hard to balance my family and my work at the same time so you have a feeling of being torn.’
K HR consultant
From employee to consultant = redundancy
Set up own consultancy and still works for EMA Independent, good money, took 2 yrs
Redundant angry Now more hours Low control ‘sadness’ Drank more
People who stayed got better deal
Anxiety for others affected in same way. They got emotive, volatile Another company
Barman would not apply properly for redesigned job, refused lower job, left= sadness
Change - Usually very positive
Very change oriented – HR manager + consultant ‘Having helped a lot of people through change and being part of managing change I think you’re aware of all the theory in terms of what you should be doing and helping people with but I think when it impacts on you its just the, its really the ability to, how you’re going to manage your life I think.’
Marriage broke up partly because wife did not want to move to Tauranga or Hamilton – but this came soon before this change … > I was sort of compromised.. by what others wanted me to do rather than what I felt I should have done for myself’ = hugely disappointed, regret Health issues
L HR mgr
10 years of change Job design Culture
Varying degrees of Gained credibility, experience, more senior role after a longer period Happy ending, euphoric
control ‘Dark periods of time’ lost confidence ‘Hard going’ ‘self- doubting questioning’ ‘Undermined’ confusion, anger’ outcomes+process
Mgrs had to be more consultative
Anxiety for other person
“upfront”‘I’m a very competitive person.’ (= wants to win in a change) ‘and that wasn’t really the case and there were many times I did not want to do this.’ ‘up until that point in my life I’ve always done what’s expected of me pretty much. I’ve always been very conscientious and you know yeah and I think it’s the right thing. I do care a lot about people’s feelings and I don’t like to hurt people, I don’t like to…’ Change - ‘I do think I’m somebody that likes change. I’m quite comfortable working without structure and I’m quite comfortable working in an environment where things are flying at you and changes, like lots of variety and I like that.’
No – other change was different
Marriage broke up during the ongoing changes. ‘He was understanding but I think it took its toll.’ ‘I remember my husband saying to me, God can’t you just talk about anything else and you couldn’t, it’s all you ever thought about’
M Senior mgr
Restructure + redundancy self
Could have got what seemed bigger role Big redundancy payout Redundancy = opportunity = relief, excitement Varying degrees of Planned own exit
... but wasn’t ‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ ‘got nowhere’ self-doubt Lower job satisfaction Own redundancy Difficult when people’s families phones (others’ redundancies) control expected more
Some got new roles, bigger roles Some lost roles they could not cope with
MD +others made redundant Others anxiety – roller coaster
‘I like to stamp my mark on things’ (but could not here = lack of control) ‘I’m a pretty open person’ ‘I’m quite an emotional person’ ‘I tend to be fairly vigorous debater.’ Change - ‘I like change. I usually benefit from change’…>
Usually benefit form change ‘I think so’…insight that change is ‘about what is best for the business’ = can distance himself
Brother doing extremely well as CEO of listed company = bit of ‘envy’ There was some ‘sense of failure’
373
N GM
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy others
Came in as new GM and had to drive the process ‘the impact to me personally was nil’ High control Little emotion
Had to manage difficult processes Had to deal with insults
Some transferred to new co and got paid slightly extra Supervisors had fewer reports and less responsibility/hassle + = relief?
- Some were made redundant or redeployed Disbelief, denial, nervousness, anger, acceptance - managers were nervous, anxious when facing affected employees
Change - ‘I have a pretty blasé attitude towards it.’
Been through 9 restructurings in 20 years, first time I was ‘gutted’ > ‘empathy’ ‘Made me less anxious and concerned about my own future’…’until it’s personal it’s actually quite hard for people to kind of really understand what it means.
x
O employee
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Got another job elsewhere before leaving and got redund pay = grateful Relief when process was clarified= certainty Felt really good to take control over process
Made redundant Stressful Lack of control: I don’t like being a passenger Anger, frustration, totally uncomfortable
Senior people gained Some junior people got redeployed Relief when not made redundant
Those made redundant One was traumatized, crying, frightened
Change -‘I am not averse to change.’ ‘I think I’m good with change to be honest. I like to initiate it so I guess that’s an issue and because I wasn’t in control of part of that process and probably felt too far from the loci I suppose, which is something I learnt about myself.’
No – this was a different type of change
x x
P Senior mgr
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Hopeful …initially that something good would come out of it Got good job elsewhere
Disestablished division, disagreed with outcomes of change, relocated to different city, relationships broke up, ‘our function was being devalued’ Low control, expected more ‘horrible feeling of lack of control’ ‘we felt quite useless’ we had no influence over the process, felt disempowered and basically just conned. Anxiety, (about ‘whether I would have a job’ huge concern, disappointment, sadness (about loss of momentum) stress, upset, emotionally draining, tiring, hopeless, then indifferent, dissatisfied
People did not like major restructuring, culture change, terms and conditions, did not think they could ‘make a difference’ as before Loss, uncertainty, demoralising
‘I am pretty disciplined’ Change - ‘I look for opportunities...benefits’
‘My career has been built around change management exercises.’ ‘You can be quite negative and fall into a bit of a destructive pattern of whatever or you just learn to anticipate it.’ I think there’s a certain degree of comfort in the sense that the basic tasks don’t change but you just learn to anticipate and read the politics and structural sort of discussions and people…’’ You just learned to anticipate I and you can be proactive at personal level’ ‘Oh absolutely. My career has been in organisational structures and systems and organisational development and particularly in change environments, so I suppose I have been on different sides of the table, I’ve been part of teams that initiate change. I’ve been part of teams that have to live with it and been done to so in that sense I can stand back and see the bigger process. ‘this is a sector that’s used to change … we take it as part of the game’
It does affect family Involved in a lot of projects at the time. Change was distraction and it seems would slow down or stop some of the projects
374
Q Senior HR contractor
Restructuring Job redesign + cultural change
Fun, challenge, new interesting, extension of contract High control
Personal attacks, ‘screaming and yelling’ Sad, disappointed
Excitement - for those who could see benefit, e.g. promotion opportunities, challenge of new role Good outcomes for co.
Churn, fright, crashed, nervousness, stress – for those who foresaw problems with lower role or redundancy hurt, humiliation, anger, distress, those who lost their supervisory roles and took lower level work or redundancy
‘I’m a natural optimist’ ‘but never surprised’ about the way people behave Enthusiastic Change -‘I’m pretty open to change. I like change. In fact I’m not very good in maintenance environments. I guess I’m energised by change. I think I have a strong enough personality to withstand doing it unfairly or wrongly.’ Note comments on pers on flight staff p8
‘I try very hard not to take it personally.’
Yes – battle hardened, done it for 20 years, gave insights into how to manage this change. ‘We’re used to these processes regardless of the fact that we’re weary of them.’
Brought in as consultant to manage one change project, got offered others, including this big one
R Senior HR
Restructuring/ De-merger Remuneration/PFP + 360 Training Cultural change
It built credibility High degree of satisfaction in seeing people change High control
Increased workload Pressure, tired Anxiety – would it work?
The majority gained Happy if remuneration went up People were getting feedback Interest, excitement, pleasure, appreciation
Unhappy if remuneration went down Shock, horror, fear, apathy
‘it’s [pressure] sort of self-imposed because I guess I’m the sort of person that if I take something on it’s got to happen, it’s absolutely got to happen or it’s going to be a problem. I don’t like to fail. I like to and I don’t like to promise something and not deliver so it’s those sorts of, something’s driving that, but I can’t put a finger on that.’ ‘My normal style is to go for it.’ Change- ‘I usually look forward to it. I like variety and I like to be doing different things.’ It’s better if I’m driving it. I guess that comes from wanting to have the choices so not changing clothes but general attitude to change would be to choose change rather than to choose stability.
Yes – had worked in another professional services firm before : ‘I worked in another partnership … for a number of years and so I think that the understanding of the partnership model of a business was also helpful in driving the change. I think if somebody had come in from a commercial organisation where if the boss says that you do it…’
no ‘It’s not possible in professional services firm to lead the change because all the shareholders work in the business.’
S Senior mgr
Restructuring
Opportunity Significance of role has been confirmed (status) High control
Process of managing change was tough, draining
Increased resp., higher level Relief for those who wanted reduced role
Unhappiness for those who got reduced roles
Change- ‘I love change. I thrive on change. I’m a change agent’ Control makes a difference? –obviously. Will look for positives, but I have choices.
‘I’m highly seasoned in change and you know what goes with it and so I have a good emotional intelligence around what goes on’
‘No, I have a very stable personal environment therefore that enables me to you know function stably if I could call it that in the work environment going through those changes.’
T Emp- loyee then manager
Relocation to new town
Opportunity excitement Promoted More money more later when became manager
Shock, fear (reloc) Little control earlier…
Those who moved got more money, those who stayed behind got good jobs elsewhere
Some were made redundant – no payout ‘bad feeling’, traumatic
Welcome change if it is positive
Nature of film industry meant I had had lots of change
Whole family had to move to another town = partner’s job, school, friends, other family
U Shop assist.
Merger Relaxed when no redundancies were announced Low control and no expectation of any
Understaffed when some left due to take over
Some did not want to work under new manager and left Uncertainty, nervousness
‘Quite comfortable’ Not really – this was different because of no redundancies
375
V Sports facilitat
Restructure Suspension Dismissal
Won his case, got compensation
Lost money, drank more, took a job he did not want Low control Surprise, Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anger, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry > relieved (outcome/process
Concerned for impact on stakeholders
‘I guess it all depends on how quickly the whole change comes about. If it’s communicated that the change will take place over a period of time and allow adjustments and how people would move into this change or move out of this change. I think change is something that we just live with.’
Work changes impacted on home not vice versa
In the middle of organising a major forum and this got dropped
W Senior HR
Restructure Redundancy Job redsign Tech change (context) others
Opportunity to showcase change mgt skills = interest High control
More work, travel Frustration people had not embraced change (process)
Better career options + opportunities Enthusiasm but also some relief…> Good for co.
Redundancy Some lost mgt positions <..Anger, frustration…
‘My personal approach to life is pretty positive and I understand why companies do what they do and need to and therefore I’m normally with the positive brigade rather than the negative.’ ‘Usually positive but I’m not immune, like everyone else’
# ‘I have a personal interest because of my interest in change and transition so here was an opportunity to continue to apply some methodologies that I’ve used so personally it was of interest professionally.’ ‘No impact, it was more a matter of doing what I normally do although I was more hands on involved in it because of the scale of change and because of my experience. Other members of my team didn’t have the same amount of experience to support it to the degree that I did.’ Good in that it was an opportunity for me to train our management on change and transition management. It was a good opportunity for me to apply those skills myself and there were some mistakes that we made that have been valuable learning lessons for me.’ Note: Previous experience of others + need for resources, p11 = been made redundant, +13 led 20 restructurings – this was by far the most difficult
[more travel but could visit mother in home town – not change outside of work]
This was a new frontier for the company – old owners in same building
X Security guard
Building expansion Work schedules
Got permanent position, salary increase due to position = happy
No general salary change, pay for exp No control Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy Missed out on promotion = cried
Good for organization Got training Improved facilities
Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy
‘I’m quite adaptable to changes’
‘No – they were different sorts of changes’
Sometimes family were sympathetic, sometimes did not realize tensions X was suffering from
376
Y Small bus owner
Office move High control As owner: business grew Excitement, pride
Extra work, more travel Some anxiety, stress
Good for organisation Less travel for most staff
More travel for some staff
‘I do it. Just get on with it.’ ‘I think I deal with change exceptionally well’ (moved countries, organisations) ‘It’s not something I stop and think about.’
Yes - Got on with it faster and do what needs to be done.
Moved house and business at same time – no real extra pressure
Observations
1. People became cynical form either previous experience in company or with manager, or because of personality, or because of the change context, but it is not easy from many transcripts to accurately attribute it. 2. Personality – people contradicted themselves about change but then clarified it (C, D). 3. Personality – most claimed to cope well with change. Some are not happy to change but were pragmatic about it. 4. Personality – people happier to change when they are in control of the change. 5. Personality – empathy is a characteristic of both personality and EI. Can be detected if participant specifically mentions it or gives an indication of it. 6. Personality – question refers to people’s perceptions of their own adaptability to change. Some mentioned specific emotions – comfort, excitement, energized. 7. Personality – participants often indicated relevance of context of THIS change. 8. Personality – references to personality are sometimes not specifically related to openness to change, e.g. I am conscientious, care for others, I like to stamp my mark on things – but become salient in the context of a specific change 9. Personality – Big 5 openness to experience/change = Q34; conscientiousness = do what is expected; extraversion = challenge/support; agreeableness = submission or be pleasant about it, neuroticism = excessive worry 10. Personality – locus of control, people get angry, frustrated when they cannot influence/control things…and expected that they should 11. Personality – emotions such as anxiety, frustration could be dispositional or situational 12. Previous experience – compare this to frequency of change – temporal
377
Questions 37-41 Leadership and culture
Ptc.
Code
+ role
Type of
change
Outcomes for
self + ve
& control
Outcomes for
self – ve
& control
Outcomes for
others + ve
Outcomes for
others
- ve
37
Ability of leader
38
Impact on partic
39
Trustworthiness
of leader
40
EI of leader
41
Culture
A Senior manager
Restructuring Job redesign
Less influence/ Responsibility ‘Sense of loss’ ‘sadness’ Lower job satisfaction ‘It’s just not nice being on the losing side of the equation’ low control and expected more
Some mgrs like less respons. ‘relief’
Felt he should have been consulted = distress. Boss had not delivered on promises but he then did it ‘I cannot expect him to consult with me well in advance…’ …>
‘Lack of buy in.. because… it’s imposed’ (from without – being part of bigger co. I am a senior manager. Low control and expected more Some due to ‘constraints’ on GM from more senior execs – no trust here…..>
‘I think he’s a very honorable guy and a nice guy but just those things …no longer important to him.’ ‘there’s certainly been a strong loss of trust … and I had a very very high level of trust and now I don’t have such a high level of trust. ..I had an unrealistic high level of trust before’ More senior: I don’t like what I see…arrogant, petty and vain people.’ Sad ‘they have power over my future’
Some empathy and responsiveness but A did not discuss feelings.
Previously a ‘star system’ but A now believed he was no longer benefiting. ‘very strong professional managerial culture’ so A responded this way but it moved from ‘a participative culture to a directive culture’ “I didn’t believe I had any realistic opportunities to affect the change and therefore chose not to even try…and I felt a sense of grief’ ‘People in this profession are notorious for not getting in touch with their emotions’
B Junior HR
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy
Career opportunity Hugely energising Redund payout Outplacement programme used by others – got a lot satisfaction Got MBA fees paid
‘I burnt out’ (from the work and conflict) Good for CEO+GMs low control and expected more ‘It pushed me to the point where I broke and it changed my life.’ I had to work 80-90 hours per week. I didn’t have a day off for months at a time. But no time off
Redundancy package Some got good jobs elsewhere
Redundancy ‘People were suspicious, they felt betrayed’ ‘Middle managers were gutted’ staff were ‘absolutely devasted)
1st did not want B to go on project team, influenced lower level of salary not comfortable 2nd variable and contradictory, ‘crap manager’, ‘nice guy’ ‘personally really supportive but ‘I was drowning and just nobody recognised it…It didn’t seem to worry anybody.’ ‘No clear guidelines’ Failed in his respons. p20 CEO poor especially not fronting up then the issue of media coverage – lost a lot bright people- ‘slash and burn in a touchy feely caring programme’ ..> culture
Carried out tasks at ‘huge personal cost’ found experience very stressful, burned out through work and lack of operational support, but found his personal support really helpful, ‘he made me feel very positive’ B had to do it. Psych C violation Furious ‘Caused me to have to firefight’ maelstrom of anxiety
2nd Integrity yes - Not competent, ‘naïve, bungles along’ some cynical decisions made with the intent to pull the wool over the employees eyes and it annoyed me because they thought that the employees were so stupid that they couldn’t see it and that just really pissed me off. Staff: ‘People were suspicious, and they felt betrayed. They felt it was another management trick’ there was a real lack of trust in management (outsourcing, redundancies) ‘huge amount of cynicism’
2nd‘He is a lovely man but he just doesn’t care when people are drowning’ nobody cares if you are drowning’‘He doesn’t see why people are stressed.’ ‘he’s such a lovely guy but he’s completely, he’s got the lowest EQ of anybody I’ve ever met.’ ‘I remember one day going into his office and bursting into tears and he was just absolutely, you know, just couldn’t work out what was going on....he didn’t really know what to do really. He kind of patted me on the back’ Senior managers: ‘No. I wasn’t at all good at verbalizing negatives things in a framed or rational way. I mean my way of dealing with it would be to scream at somebody at that point because I would just explode at them. I didn’t have a level of emotional maturity’
Loyalty of staff to org. Lower ranks of colleagues were very ‘tight’ Aggressive union Aggressive and nasty, co. ‘the culture there is horribly dysfunctional’ [engineering] Change was done in a ‘slash and burn kind of way’ Line managers cared about their people deeply Senior managers cut off from workforce…insensitive, never listened… never interacted. ‘Lies…lack of caring for junior staff’ Expectations of huge amount of work with little reward and no help Culture of not addressing performance issues ‘I hadn’t been comfortable with the culture really since I’d been working there. I didn’t like the culture at all. That was why I was leaving really. It was because of the culture.’
378
C Senior manager
Take over: division sold Location move Redundancy for some others
New co. committed to expansion of mnf Severance package Some control ‘relaxed’ about the new employers ‘Positive people’ Pleased, less stressful than The company
‘disappointed’ to leave company after 33 years. Redund was stressful Some control Lower remuneration Lousy office Job had less challenge Lower job satisfaction
Some made redundant ‘shock, dismay, real concern’
Note: moved from one organisation to the other, therefore leadership/culture issues vary Owners were being difficult New people easy to work with Both companies made effort to treat staff fairly ‘He wanted to do right by me’ cordial, amicable, gave info
Probably made it easy to move if from the way management on both sides did it
‘I’m not sure he ever told you the whole story about what he was thinking and what he intended to do.’ But…he probably wasn’t not allowed to by his bosses ‘He was probably less trustworthy than others I have worked with.’
The company boss was quite sensitive which was quite surprising because ‘he can be a proper bastard when he wants to.’ But I’ve learnt ‘not to talk about those things at that level with my bosses over the years’
The company – gloomy atmosphere, facing strong comp., ‘change in sense of direction –too corporate Metalfab – more positive, more like family business, ‘helped ease me into the transition’
D HR consultant
Redundancy Started own business ‘in hindsight it was a favour’ It was a real cathartic exercise. It made me move on mentally’
No control Move back to remun or redundant ‘distressed, shock, betrayal. I felt emotionally attached to the org.’ ‘I wanted to howl my eyes out, angry
Got a shock because there had been no redundancies before
1st MD ‘benevolent despot, very autocratic. Got angry when D would not go, very uncomfortablel, upset He liked to be in total control. but…he was being pushed to do it. Did it poorly 2nd MD Letter from lawyer about restraint of trade - pretty stink
Shock, horror, stress, made her resist going immediately –stubborn, ‘got my back up’ got a lawyer ‘I wanted to sit there and howl’ ‘It was a real cathartic exercise…made me move on mentally’
‘I questioned everything he did and set out to do.’
1st MD ‘He didn’t once look me in the eye.’ This was unlike him. - sign of guilt? ‘It’s quite possible that he thought because I didn’t cry I wasn’t affected by it.’ ‘He kept right out of my way.’
Had been nice place to work , generous, social club, surprising the way the redundancy was handled given the supportive culture of the organisation.
E Senior HR
Restructure ‘Satisfaction’ helped build relationships, exert influence- High control ..but note comments on ‘circle of concern v circle of influence’
Extra work ‘Stress’ But little other emotional impact
Good for co. More jobs Some got better positions Grief acceptance
Some redundancies One big loser at senior level cycle Shock denial
E = one of the change managers at senior level, change leader = colleague MD of insurance co. MD handled it well –took a lot advice Had a very strong relationship with CEO of holding co.
Glad to be able to support it
Yes She was responsive to my thoughts and feelings. She had high EQ.
It was a challenging culture, people encouraged to ask questions, vocal, good communication, regular feedback
F Tech mgr then HR mgr
Restructure = transfer
Got into new career (HR) silver lining anticipation looking forward
Little control ‘being done unto and left to clean up the mess’ black cloud ‘royal pain in the neck distressing’ trepidation, concern’ Transition phase was ‘bloody horrible’
Relief (ownership issue) Some got good roles.
Some redundancy ‘you were left with nobody who understood how this thing [restructuring] was supposed to work’ = confusion = 6/10 Token consultation GM - a ‘fantastic guy’ was indecisive – did not say which of two people would management role and left it to them to work out for a few months Outstanding mentor in new role
Royal pain in the neck, quite distressing Gave me a sense of support, ‘talking things through and allaying some of the concerns’
‘There was no deceitfulness…There certainly was political, manipulative behaviour on the part of some, but it didn’t go so far as to lead to a sense of distrust.’
Manager yes - understood his concerns – but wasn’t in a position to influence much – treated him with respect. Listened. Provided support. ‘I couldn’t have asked for more than that.’ (but left the role in limbo) Others no
Creation of people development person - ‘They recognised somehow that people were actually important in the process. Goodness gracious me.’ Culture had a little impact on G’s response to change – financial imperative
379
G Senior HR
Branch closed = redundancy for others
Pride, because no PGs High control
Extra work, extra travel, ‘Stress’ anxiety, nervousness meeting deadlines
Got other jobs Excellent redundancy package
Redundancy ‘pissed off, angry ‘stressed’, ‘personal grieving process Extra work for HO staff
G= one of the change leaders Seems to have had excellent approach Project manager (colleague) was outstanding and CEO ‘owned it, he was the one in the gun’ Visibly supported by senior mangement
Seemed to give comfort + confidence
Change pressures =‘I had to delegate – trust my staff CEO had a lot integrity he was the one ‘in the gun’ – fronted up ‘Trust is something we thrive on’ …….>
Good communication, support
* Organisation had been high in support but not accountability, now a performance culture but still seems one with a focus on supporting people –change to be ‘in line with our values to be respectful and supportive’ ‘Or frame of reference was, if that’s happening to me, what would I want to happen?’ Also core value is customer ethic ‘I think that [org culture] was the glue that made it doable.’ See p20 – values – made it easy
H GM then senior mgr
Ownership change. Job change finally left
Low control expected much more Reported to own subordinate Lost authority, status ‘shock’ ‘indignant’ (IT change) Excluded from board meetings, governance, social functions Shifting of staff loyalties
Subordinate got GM job Owners got their man in charge
Some people left HR manager resigned Leader changed
First was excellent, gave me autonomy, support Second worse then reported to third, new CEO Communication by email - abrupt ‘through that awkward period there was very little interaction’
Helpful Felt she was losing – not managing up ‘I couldn't lift my head above that and think right, how do I, how do I manage’
First, very trustworthy 2nd chairman dishonest about appointing marketing manager then making him CEO But ‘he was a puppet’ of major shareholder No respect for three directors/shareholders ‘no integrity’
1st knew how H felt ‘we had a very open and transparent and honest relationship’ Others – ‘they didn’t respond at all’ even though they had an office next door ‘communication was by email’ –‘abrupt’ 2nd chair worked with H’s grandfather ‘I put him in a situation he was not comfortable with.’ H upset, had an emotional outburst’
‘fundamental’ culture change to personnel/industrial relations focus from a people focus And it was all about ‘dollars and cents and bottom line and about the numbers, about the sales… and aggressive chasing of debtors’ Became very male oriented, rugby, races, Friday night drinks Turf protection – ‘It was getting ugly.’
J SC 1st level mgr
Cut costs Low control expected more More work More hours More pressure Anger resentment
Good for client A few redundancies anxiety
No consultation – ‘not very happy because the process that was given to me is just I don’t want to know about how difficult or why it can’t be done…I just want to know that its going to be done.’ Good technical skills but not interpersonal skills…
‘I didn’t feel I had the support.’ It did not make me feel comfortable.’ ‘disregard, no consideration’
Did not trust him to do anything about it.
Low empathy –‘more lip service than true understanding’ “I do it, why don’t you?”(extra hours) Think he did know how I felt but it was never discussed
‘culture of bowing down’ ‘the culture was never say no’ ‘the attitude that the customer is number one taken to the extreme’ (cutting prices to keep customers)
K HR consultant
From employee to consultant = redundancy
Set up own consultancy and still works for EMA Independent, god money, took 2 yrs
Redundant angry Now more hours Low control ‘sadness’ Drank more
People who stayed got better deal
Anxiety for others affected in same way Others very volatile, very emotive, Another company
Barman would not apply properly for redesigned job, refused lower job, left= sadness
Their offer to staff was inadequate and was changed for people who stayed. Not prepared to negotiate. not upfront.
Not asked ‘not upfront’‘..the top manager probably lacked genuine credibility about the fact that he had been driving to achieve this change as part of his ability to earn a bonus in terms of achieving his goals but contradiction 1-1 good rel with CEO + GM, felt they were being honest
They were sympathetic professional
380
L HR mgr
13 years of change Job design Culture
Varying degrees of Gained credibility, experience, more senior role after a longer period Happy ending, euphoric
control ‘Dark periods of time’ lost confidence ‘Hard going’ ‘self- doubting questioning’ ‘Undermined’ confusion, anger’ outcomes+process
Mgrs had to be more consultative
Anxiety for other person Note establishment of HR role meant ‘taking power’ from senior managers’
Note various leaders over 13 years. Another HR person was poorly managed: weak rationale, structure, poor process, comments ‘may the best man win’ (sexist + expectation of fighting it out) “didn’t like to deliver bad news.’ ‘you’d never really have a straight conversation with him’
Felt undermined, doubted her self-worth – confusion, intense anger, anxiety, ‘That is all I thought about all weekend, all night, all day, that was it. I lived, ate and breathed it and that was not a good thing.’ Sleepless nights
‘I was looking out for where’s the loophole, where’s the trap’ ‘I also felt that if they could do that to one person then at any time could they do that to me so you’re always wary.’ ‘Is it a smokescreen’
‘may the best man win’ – lack of EI Organisation did not deliberately set out to hurt people but managers were low in EI
it’s a very good organisation and fabulous people in it but I think at the time there wasn’t a realisation about this wasn’t a number, this was a person and these are people …you can crunch numbers but crunching people is not good.’ ..> ‘Patronising in some situations, empathetic in others’
*Ch= ‘may the best man win’ ‘Technical people often are very good solo operators but not always good team players’ ‘Always having to prove you [HR] could contribute’ ‘people were fair’,‘you are always treated with respect’ but… culture changed over the years p23-At the time.. the organisation was very male, engineering male, technical, not emotional on the outside. Very, very strong technical people and still are today, very, very good and now they’ve got that other dimension where there is a lot of emotional acceptance but then it wasn’t like that’ –You’re soft if you cry old boy network ‘it was confusing too because sometimes it was okay to, sometimes they expected you to be girly and other ‘If you were not an engineer you were an overhead’ ‘you toed the line’
M Senior mgr
Restructure + redundancy self
Could have got what seemed bigger role Big redundancy payout Redundancy = opportunity = relief, excitement Varying degrees of Planned own exit
... but wasn’t ‘It was not the sort of stuff that excites me.’ ‘got nowhere’ self-doubt Lower job satisfaction Own redundancy Difficult when people’s families phones (others’ redundancies) control expected more
Some got new roles, bigger roles Some lost roles they could not cope with
MD +others made redundant Others anxiety – roller coaster
MD handled it poorly, ‘bullying…yelled, ranted and raved’ Created conflict Poor process not sufficient participation at lower levels Note: 1-1 leader was bad, but in exec meetings much better
‘I didn’t feel included and I didn’t want to feel included because there was such poor leadership’ Made me feel week frustration + anger + devastation
‘There was a lack of trusting…while we debated openly there was stuff going on behind closed doors so there was a trust issue there’ = frustration + anger Own integrity: ‘I have some personal values that I won’t compromise and it stretched some of those pretty tight which makes you really question your own integrity’ (note guilt about not revealing some info). ‘I have a high reliance on personal integrity and tend to look at people based on that as well.’
Did not know what he thought, felt –‘it just doesn’t go in.’ ‘He heard the noise but didn’t understand the message’ Low leader EI No empathy
‘that was part of the culture of the business that you should front them and tell them yourself’ rather than get HR to do it. ‘Take responsibility for your own actions’ “robust debate around the facts, not around what people want to hear. ‘Culture change takes a long time... they’re not interested in that.’ ‘Culture is directed. It is top driven…but it needs the support of the majority to be effective
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N GM
Outsourcing Restructuring Redundancy others
Came in as new GM and had to drive the process ‘the impact to me personally was nil’ High control Little emotion
Had to manage difficult processes Had to deal with insults
Some transferred to new co and got paid slightly extra Supervisors had fewer reports and less responsibility/ hassle+ = relief?
- Some were made redundant or redeployed Disbelief, denial, nervousness, anger, acceptance managers were nervous, anxious when facing affected employees
GM = Change leader/mgr ‘driving the process to a conclusion’ Boss – exec of holding co. His boss – got support
Appreciated support – but not much impact on how N felt, thought, acted
As leader: ‘being open and honest and upfront with people [putting] your cards on the table, and that certainly dispels a lot of the distrust and emotional reactions …people become quite sceptical of the situation’
Company prides itself on how it exits staff- fairly Will look at redeployment first Treat people right
O Employee
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Got another job elsewhere before leaving got redund pay grateful Relief when process was clarified= certainty Felt really good to take control over process
Made redundant Stressful Lack of control: I don’t like being a passenger Anger, frustration Totally uncomfortable when out of control of process
Senior people gained Some junior people got redeployed Relief when not made redundant
Those made redundant One was traumatized, crying, frightened
New GM alienated a lot of people Came from a different country and did not understand NZ context… there were some ‘cultural issues’
Manager was good but it was out of his hands – very supportive, asked how we were feeling No faith in CEO
Manager -Good, valued, supported Kept us cohesive, focused CEO – lost trust, lost respect, lost confidence in her ability to lead <……
asked how we were feeling, engaged on an emotional level new CEO was ‘cold and clinical’ but knew on a general level people were gloomy, unhappy
New CEO did not seem to live values org stood for Her manner was different She changed the culture and structure ‘We don’t practice what we preach’ = detached Earlier we were cohesive. Committed. Good social env
P Senior mgr
Restructuring Redundancy self + others
Hopeful …initially that something good would come out of it Got good job elsewhere
Disestablished division, disagreed with outcomes of change, relocated to different city, relationships broke up, ‘our function was being devalued’ Low control, expected more ‘horrible feeling of lack of control’ ‘we felt quite useless’ we had no influence over the process, felt disempowered and basically just conned. Anxiety, (about ‘whether I would have a job’ concern, disappointment, sadness (about loss of momentum) stress, upset, emotionally draining, tiring, hopeless, then indifferent, dissatisfied
People did not like major restructuring, culture change, terms and conditions, did not think they could ‘make a difference’ as before Loss, uncertainty, demoralising
Own managers were good but not of Ministry Others – left organisation because of changes and the way they were managed. Process also demoralised people. HFA mgrs looked after their people ‘they showed huge leadership in you know recognised, being able to step back from their personal situation and recognise that we couldn’t afford as a sector to lose this talent’
low expectations of meaningful support – helped to decide to leave
Own managers yes, very open, but said they had little control Ministry process not transparent ‘they were a bunch of bastards’ Did not trust their integrity or ability to manage change’
‘Validated my feelings’ …empathy ministry people– ‘disinterested’
** ‘We were a kind of team that felt really important to understand intellectually what we were trying to achieve ..and we needed to understand intellectually why is our function being shaped this way, how does it sit within an organisation structure and so when the team felt quite unclear and we were not convinced and personally people weren’t being engaged. Nobody was talking to us about why these things were happening, so when you go through the mechanics of the process with that lack of, I suppose consensus about what it is that we’re trying to achieve its a hugely stressful process because some people went through the mechanics, just chucked their job description without really thinking about do I really want to be here and some of us, like myself, we made a conscious decision that this is not what we actually want” ‘I think people within the Ministry were pretty cold hearted about it. There was a real culture of you know stamping out any of the sort of features of the culture in the past. It was a sort of take over big brother, stomping on little brother.’’ culture died’ * see p18 bureaucratic v devolved mgt style
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Q Senior HR contractor
Restructuring Job redesign redundancies + Cultural
Fun, challenge, new interesting, extension of contract High control
Personal attacks, ‘screaming and yelling’ Sad, disappointed
Excitement - for those who could see benefit, e.g. promotion opportunities, challenge of new role Good outcomes for co.
Churn, fright, crashed, nervousness, stress – for those who foresaw problems with lower role or redundancy hurt, humiliation, anger, distress, those who lost their supervisory roles and took lower level work or redundancy
Q= change leader, on contract BUT… “I wasn’t the owner of the change. I was the change agent…I guess in some respects I was able to remove myself from it a little bit.’ Senior mgt – good management of change
‘quite a diverse group of people’ above , with ‘different drivers’ Both immediate managers were supportive
Staff - sceptical of change Q with ref to some senior staff concerned ‘manipulation of the process to a different end’ (reduction in headcount) Some of them were dishonest
One boss very ‘mechanical’ other more emotional and emotionally responsive Both were supportive
* ‘Massive absenteeism, performance issues, no ownership of customer issues…came in...did their job and walked out again’ see also p10 – we did not have high perform. culture New expectations…p2 ‘Very service oriented military style’ of promotion Affect on job culture – ‘that’s an extremely emotional group of people’ ‘used to being looked after and people being warm and gentle and caring’ ‘parent to child relationship’ Differing levels of resistance p 20
R Senior HR
Restructuring De-merger Remuneration Perf mgt Open plan Culture
It built credibility High degree of satisfaction in seeing people change High control
Increased workload Pressure, tired Anxiety – would it work?
The majority gained Happy if remuneration went up People were getting feedback Interest, excitement, pleasure, appreciation
Unhappy if remuneration went down Shock, horror, fear, apathy
R= change leader CEO supportive he worked very closely behind the scenes with us. Attended a few of the workshops…Talked to a few of the partners.
Definitely, calming, reassuring, tried to reduce R’s frustration
CEO - Genuine Staff - ‘We were dealing with people who had no faith in the system [remun] because they didn’t know how it worked.’ ‘There was no trust that anything would improve.’ They’ve tried change before…cynicism + apathy
‘Not always, no’ but could detect emotions and seemed partly responsive ‘He knew what I chose to share’ = EI, EL
* Needed to change culture ‘Grapevine chats’ [rem] > ‘transparent understanding’ Nature of professional services firm. ‘…the partners say you must be joking.’ ‘The partners had to take ownership of stuff’ Conservative culture , ‘archaic’.. ‘incredibly traditional –less commercial than other graduates.’ ‘blinkers’.. ‘not emotional people’ =fear of showing emotion Lack of openness [rem+] Hidden things – deals that had been done in the past’ Open plan = transparency Cynicism ‘We were trying to build a culture of integrating and sharing and working as a team.’ But – momentum and hunger building – recognition of some of need for change ‘it was the leadership ready to make the difference’
S Senior mgr
Restructuring
Opportunity Significance of role has been confirmed (status) High control
Process of managing change was tough, draining
Increased resp., higher level Relief for those who wanted reduced role
Unhappiness for those who got reduced roles
Change leader GM could have done a better job of encouraging me
Would have appreciate support but still got on with job
Trusted both ability and integrity
Yes – but could have been more supportive. ‘He never saw the pain people went through.’
Perception of staff that they did not have fun. But through changes people felt tired. Ambivalent: managers used to change, part of culture but Gen Y people not used to so much change – needed to reassure staff and became impatient Seemed to have a culture that even during change you had to deliver results.
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T Employee then manager
Relocation to new town
Opportunity excitement Promoted More money more later when became manager
Shock, fear (reloc) Little control earlier…
Those who moved got more money, those who stayed behind got good jobs elsewhere
Some were made redundant – no payout ‘bad feeling’, traumatic
Initially fine then..‘He kind of left us, abandoned ship and left us down there’ He was bull-headed = anger, frustration
“I felt undervalued.”
Competence OK, integrity not
‘I spoke my mind but it fell on deaf ears.’
The industry is one when there are frequent changes due to its project nature.
U Shop assist.
Merger Relaxed when no redundancies were announced Low control and no expectation of any
Understaffed when some left due to take over Another co: locks on door changed by liquidators – felt cheated because promised more time surprise
Some did not want to work under new manager and left Uncertainty, nervousness
OK/not great but it was out of their control (old branch manager before takeover)
Minimal Another co: locks on door changed by liquidators – felt cheated because promised more time to look for other jobs – surprise, anxious
V Sports facilitat
Restructure Suspension Dismissal
Won his case, got compensation
Lost money, drank more, took a job he did not want Low control Surprise, Pain, heartache, mental anguish, hurt, uncertainty, anger, anxiety, feeling down, gloomy, very angry > relieved (outcome/process
Various stakeholders were perceived to have lost from his dismissal
Extremely poor, nature of communication regarding change, (+p11)taking computer, suspension, dismissal, nature of conversations at meetings Thought he was ‘trying to clean out the house and get rid of everybody who was associated with the old CEO’
But …………….> * The acts of the CEO were the dominant factor in this change
Thought he was competent in managing org but not change but had no integrity. Dishonest about how many roles and nature of roles, why computer had been taken (from someone else) Also dealt with replacement CEO and did not trust him either
‘I think he must have gathered how I felt due to some of the emails’
Changed when new GM took over, not from NZ, did not understand culture of NZ or specific ethnic stakeholders. Previously ‘very laid back’ Not given enough resources – money for resources being put into buildings
W Senior HR
Restructure Redundancy Job redsign Tech change (context) others
Opportunity to showcase change mgt skills = interest High control
More work, travel Frustration people had not embraced change (process)
Better career options + opportunities Enthusiasm but also some relief…> Good for co.
Redundancy Some lost mgt positions <..Anger, frustration…
W = change leader Seems to have aimed at fairness, open communication (except for confidentiality) CEO was very supportive, local GM ‘wanted results and wanted them quickly’ but did not appreciate the effort and skill W was contributing Some of ‘staff thought it was done appallingly badly’. ‘This was by far the most difficult because of the set of circumstances’
CEO support seemed to give confidence, GM lack of appreciation to some degree resented
Note ‘ lack of trust’ in previous management by staff, ‘suspicion’ W trusted CEO
Yes- CEO was very supportive, acknowledging the effort we’d put in, praising it, backing what we were doing.
*Takeover + tech change: other org had different culture, esp. re change, managers decide and get on with it quickly. This one was much slower, more consultative. We need to change the culture NB p4, 10, 13, 21 resistance to change, co. had been through several restructurings, lack of trust, suspicion ‘ they would have a project team behind closed doors’ = W’s frustration ‘We didn’t realise there was a gap until we were part way through it.’ ‘They would have been deeply scarred by their previous employer.’
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X Security guard
Building expansion Work schedules
Got permanent position, salary increase due to position = happy
No general salary change, pay for exp No control Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy Missed out on promotion = cried
Good for organization Got training Improved facilities
Schedule changes, extra work, parking problems, had to deal with customer dissatisfaction = unhappy
People blamed for issues beyond their control. (a) Criticised for being marginally late.(a) Not allowed to go to doctor’s appt + nature of remarks made (a) Changes to application for leave We were told to follow orders Senior mgt good in giving initial info and updates but did not organize other aspects of change well.
Leadership style resented and seemed to breed resistance to several changes – and finally left. Perceived systemic injustice
‘They had betrayed trust’ (promotion) Boss – ‘at times she was very nasty…tried to gain advantage for herself and some of her favourites’ Spent time on personal emails or internet. Did not trust ability either… could have supported staff regarding notification of schedule changes’
‘She sensed my feelings but she was happy’ that I did not voice them When X cried and she tried to reassure him he did not believe it was genuine – ‘she was trying to cover up’ = no trust
Professionalism re customer needs. Survey after change revealed considerable staff dissatisfaction. Nepotism re promotion Dishonesty counter to security values ‘You couldn’t be a rebel in the organisation...in the ‘team’ You became a target because a target is always hit upon’(get the worst tasks) if you argued, queried matters. ‘You have to humbly accept what is dished out to you’
Y Small bus owner
Office move High control As owner: business grew Excitement, pride
Extra work, more travel Some anxiety, stress
Good for organisation Less travel for most staff
More travel for some staff
Participant was change leader
n/a n/a n/a Strongly committed to client base – partly prompted to move to this location We’ve always been very close, families socialise – this helped in the move Enthusiasm, passion and pride, cultural identity
Observations
1. Issues of leadership at times refer to leadership/management of change – at others leadership before the change, at others – leadership after the change. 2. Issues of culture at times specifically answer question how did culture affect your response to change. Aspects of culture also noted through other comments made about culture in general. 3. Intersection of leadership and culture – e.g. people being blamed for issues beyond their control 4. Intersection of trust and culture (see Q) 5. Intersection of culture and justice – systemic justice (difficult to gauge since questions were about fairness of change. 6. Intersection of emotions and culture –e.g. R lawyers are not emotional people –fear of showing emotion 7. Intersection of leadership with justice = table with both 8. Intersection of leadership and participant EI (R - ‘He knew what I chose to share’) =table with both 9. Sometimes a new leader/manager is the outcome of the change and therefore some of the reflections apply to the first or second leader or both. 10. Leaders/manager/recipient of change not easy to separate – partly depends on perceived/expected degree of control. (N, R) 11. Several people are often considered when change management/leadership questions are asked. This can lead to ambiguous answers. (Q:18) 12. Participants at times give benefit of the doubt on leadership and trust issues in the sense that the person creating injustice may have been pushed into it by those higher up. 13. Most of those leading change seemed to have support from more senior manager and most did not seem to require more. Questions on leadership ability, trust, had little relevance or impact. 14. Need a column for leading/managing change or separate table. 15. Need a column for comments on change processes. Check for reference to roller coaster (Q –no) and marathon effect (Q and R) 16. Organisational culture: sometimes departmental culture a factor (B)